EIGHTH GENERATION

1869. Martha Louise Hunter was born on 21 May 1910 in Fort Worth, Tarrant County, Texas. ⁽¹⁴⁴⁶⁾ She died on 4 Feb 2002 in Bryan, Brazos County, Texas. She was buried on 9 Feb 2002 in Austin Memorial Park, Travis County, Texas. ⁽¹⁴⁴⁷⁾ She employed by the National Finance Credit Corporation of Texas from 1931 to 1936 in Fort Worth, Tarrant County, Texas.
Excerpt from:

THE WALL STREET JOURNAL, MONDAY, APRIL 14,1986, Page 1, Central Column, and Page 20

Out in the Outback, Halley's Comet Gets Panned by the Critics
Whisp Near the Milky Way Is Blacked Out by Rain, Which Almost Never Falls

{Note this is an article on people observing Halley's Comet in Alice Springs, Australia:}

The admonition is certainly lost on the amateur astronomers who have traveled halfway round the world to view the comet.

"I've always thought of it as my comet," says Louise Beard, staring hard into the clear desert sky. Mrs. Beard was born in Fort Worth, Texas, just as Halley's comet passed by in 1910. Her brothers were sent out of the house to "go look at the comet" as she was being delivered.

"I just hope I don't do a Mark Twain," says Mrs. Beard, "come and go on a comet year."



Obituary For Martha Louise (Hunter) Beard
May 21, 1910 - February 4, 2002
The Bryan Eagle, Friday, February 8, 2002

Mrs. Jim B. Beard

Beloved wife and mother, Louise Hunter Beard, age 91, died Monday, February 4, 2002, at her home in Bryan, Texas. She was born on May 21, 1910, in her parent's home in Fort Worth, Texas. Her parents were Robert Alexander Hunter and Mary Ella Randall Hunter of Fort Worth, Texas. Her paternal grandparents were Joseph Love Hunter and Sarah Matilda Dupuy Hunter. Her maternal grandparents were Albert Randall and Martha Ann Martin Randall of Fort Worth.

Louise attended Texas Christian University and TSCW where she studied music. On December 31, 1932, Louise married James Blanton Beard, and they lived in several Texas cities while he worked for Sinclair. In 1942, he bought a small freight company in Bryan, which later became Beard Transfer and Storage.

Louise was devoted to her church from the time she joined at age five with her brothers. She was an active member of First United Methodist Church in Bryan since 1942. Louise taught in the Children's Division for over 25 years and then was one of the teachers in her Amiga Sunday School Class until six years ago.

She was a loving mother and very active in the PTA while her three children were in school. When Crockett Elementary School was opened in 1949, she wrote the school song, which is still in use today. She had a deep love and appreciation for all types of cultural events, music, drama and dance. Music, in particular, was a constant in her life. She not only instilled these interests but also encouraged them in her children and grandchildren.

When Louise was born in 1910, Haley's Comet was in the sky. She and her husband ventured to Alice, Australia, to see it again in 1986. While there, she spoke to a young Australian reporter about how the author Samuel Clemens (Mark Twain), commented once, "I came in with the Comet and will go out with it," which turned out to actually happen as he died in 1910. Louise related to the reporter that she also was born when the Comet was in the sky but added, "I have no intention of going out with it!" The reporter wrote an article on Haley's Comet with her comments that later ended up on the front page of The Wall Street Journal.

She is survived by her husband, James Blanton Beard, of Bryan; a sister, Carie Marie Jones of Houston; three children, daughters, Elsie Hunt of Paris, France, and Nancy Cochran of Austin, and a son, James Lealand Beard of Bryan; two sons-in-law, Revered Ernest E. Hunt III and James H. Cochran; one daughter-in-law, Darlynne Beard; six grandchildren, Ernest E. Hunt IV and his wife Holly, of New York City, Elizabeth Hunt-Blanc of Dallas, Christopher Martin McCollum and Kevin Wayne McCollum and his wife Lisa, all of Austin, Lucinda Michelle Beard of Austin and her fiancé Kenneth Hogan of Houston, and James Blanton Beard II of Bryan; four great-grandchildren, Jose and Thomas Blanc and Tyler and Ethan McCollum; and many nieces and nephews. She was preceded in death by her grandson Dick Blanton McCollum, her parents, and her brothers, Homer Alexander Hunter and Robert Lealand Hunter.

Visitation will be Friday, February 9th, 2002, from 4 p.m. until 7 p.m. at Memorial Funeral Chapel in Bryan. Funeral services will take place at 11 a.m. Saturday at First United Methodist Church in Bryan, with Reverends Ernest E. Hunt III and Marlin Finn officiating. A graveside service will take place at 2:30 p.m. at the Austin Memorial Park, 2800 Hancock Drive, in Austin.

Memorials may be made to First United Methodist Church, 506 East 28th Street, Bryan, TX 77803.


HOMILY FOR LOUISE BEARD

Delivered at First Methodist Church of Bryan, Texas, February 9, 2002
The Very Rev. Dr. Ernest E. Hunt, III

ON BEING WELCOMED

My oldest memory of Louise has always been one of welcome. I met her for the first time at her front door, after her daughter Elsie, at the university, brought me home from the Episcopal seminary in Austin for the thanksgiving day holidays. Louise greeted me warmly, which was not always the way seminarians were received by some families who wanted their daughters to have boyfriends with at least some potential, like business, engineering or law! Yet Louise and I talked about theology and the church, and I realized soon thereafter that I had a new friend, who appreciated what I had chosen to do with my life, and in time incorporated me into a new family.

Louise and Jim blessed us every step of the way, traveling first to rural California, then to suburban St. Louis, New York City and state, back to Dallas, and finally to Paris, France. Wherever we went Louise would come, to be helpful with two new babies, Ernie and Elizabeth, and even our grandchildren, Jose and Thomas, or just to welcome a new area, church and church friends.

Louise did request that I say one thing for her at her burial, which is: "she loved the church since she was five years old." Now I know why she welcomed a wandering stranger to the family because she loved the church so much, and that commitment continued to bless us in all the many places Elsie and I have lived and served. And because she loved the church she also knew the meaning of Christ's love, its inclusive and accepting nature, its overcoming of grief, its endurance, its seeing into the heart of things, and its helping us to look for the best in others. Such love knows no boundaries as Louise knew so well It only knows welcome." I was a stranger and you welcomed me."

My son sent me an article concerning Halley's comet from the Wall Street Journal of April 1986 in which she was quoted while on a trip to Australia. As she looked to the sky to see from that vast country the comet pass by, she told the reporter that while she was being delivered in Fort Worth her brothers were sent out of the house to "go look at the comet". Then she commented: "I just hope I don't do a Mark Twain and come and go on a comet year." she didn't. She outlasted Halley, and now it's her turn to be welcomed by the greater heavenly host who will say; "Come, O blessed of my father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world."

She was married to James Blanton Beard (son of William DeWitt "Dick W." Beard and Elsie Mary Rutledge) on 31 Dec 1932 in Fort Worth, Tarrant County, Texas. James Blanton Beard was born on 7 Sep 1908 in Austin, Travis County, Texas.⁽¹⁴⁴⁸⁾ He appeared on the census on 2 Apr 1930 in Austin, Travis County, Texas. ⁽¹⁴⁴⁹⁾ He died on 10 Oct 2009 in Bryan, Brazos County, Texas. He was buried on 15 Oct 2009 in Austin Memorial Park, Travis County, Texas.⁽¹⁴⁵⁰⁾
Mr. Beard graduated in 1931 from the University of Texas where he played on the football team.

Worked for Sinclair Oil Company at various locations in Texas: 1932, lived at 1021 Orange Street, Fort Worth; worked as Salesman for Sinclair in Dallas. In January, 1936, moved to San Antonio, Schley Street. Worked as Supervisor of Service Stations. In June, 1937, moved to Kingsville, Texas, and lived on Alice Street. Became District Agent/Auditor. In January, 1938, moved to Temple, Texas, on South 11th. Became District Auditor. Territory included Bryan, Texas. In July, 1939, moved to Waco, Texas; had same job. Lived off 25th Street.

In November, 1942, bought a freight business in Bryan, Texas. After World War II, became an agent and stockholder in United Van Lines. Had agencies in Temple, Amarillo, and Lake Charles, Texas. Retired in 1995, and sold business in 1999.


Oldest living Longhorn recalls a very different time
By John Maher
AMERICAN-STATESMAN STAFF
Tuesday, June 30, 2009

James Blanton Beard was a starter but never a star for the University of Texas football team.
"Of the 13 boys on the Texas team," he recalled, "I was the only one who didn't make somebody's first team All-Southwestern."

Beard has certainly proved to be the most durable Longhorn, though.

He joined the team in 1926 and lettered in 1929, in the days of one-platoon football. He turned an even 100 during the 2008 football season, and he's the oldest living Longhorn football player.

Like many other UT fans, he is looking forward to the 2009 campaign and will watch it with a trained eye. Asked about Longhorn football coach Mack Brown, Beard paused and said, "He's bound to be a good coach or he wouldn't win like he does. I don't always agree with what he's doing, but they're paying him $3 million and me nothing, so my deal don't count for anything."

Some of his recollections, however, are priceless bits of Longhorn history.

Beard lives in the last place you probably would look for a longtime Longhorn - in Bryan, just a few blocks away from College Station and the Texas A&M campus. "I had a chance to buy a freight agency over here, and I took it," he said by way of explanation. "Then I drifted into the moving business and stayed in it for 50 years."

He worked at Beard Transfer & Storage until he was 87. These days he wears a hearing aid, but the years have been relatively kind to him. Beard still has UT season tickets, although his daughter, Nancy, and her husband now use them.

For decades, Beard attended both Texas and Texas A&M football games, even occasionally doubling up. Now, he watches on TV and notes how the game has changed.
"They wouldn't even issue us uniforms today," Beard said of his former teammates. "Our center weighed 150 pounds, and our tackles weighed about 170."

There were no athletic scholarships when Beard played, but that didn't mean there wasn't pressure to win. After the Longhorn varsity's 5-4 season in 1926, coach E.J. "Doc" Stewart was forced out with a four-year record of 24-9-3. He was replaced by assistant Clyde Littlefield, a three-sport star during his UT playing days.

As a player, Littlefield had popularized the forward pass at UT, but that was not his coaching style.

"I was in the last three or four years where the run was the thing," Beard said. "The pass was just ordinary. You didn't build an offense on passing. You had to run the football if you were going to win.

"Today you've got a boy that can throw the ball 40 yards down the field and a boy that can catch it. We didn't have that. All we had was boys that could throw the ball 30 to 35 yards and sometimes someone would catch it and sometimes they wouldn't."

Coaches weren't allowed to signal in plays from the sideline when Beard played, and substitutes couldn't say anything to anyone until after a snap had been taken. Opposing players would sometimes try to exploit that when subs entered the game.

"A lot of smart boys would run up and shake hands and say, 'How are you?' " Beard recalled. "Of course, if the poor kid opened his mouth, it was 15 yards."

Playing at halfback and linebacker, Beard was a backup in 1927 and again in 1928, when Texas first wore burnt orange jerseys.

Beard lived near the 4000 block of Guadalupe Street with his grandmother. Although a streetcar ride to campus cost a dime, Beard usually got up at 6 a.m. and made the 30-minute walk to campus. He might take a trolley back to save his legs, because the team scrimmaged up to two hours a day three days a week.

Players of years past
In 1928, Beard played behind several halfbacks, including sophomore Dexter Shelley of Austin. Beard rates Shelley and Ernie Koy, who joined the varsity in 1930, as the best players the Longhorns had at that time, but he said Leo Baldwin, a player considered a gridiron washout, "was probably the greatest athlete ever in the Southwest. ... He was a one-man gang."

Baldwin arrived from Wichita Falls, where he was not only a football star but the winner of seven individual titles at the state track and field meet from 1923 to '24. Beard recalled that Ralph Hammond, a two-time national middleweight wrestling champion who became UT's first Olympian in 1928, learned firsthand about Baldwin's athletic prowess.
Hammond, Beard said, "always wanted to wrestle with you. He'd hurt you if he could. He kept fooling with Leo enough that he said all right, and Leo just picked him up and turned him upside down and threw him down and sat on him. He didn't bother Leo any more."
By 1928, though, an ankle injury had left Baldwin "a shadow of his former self," Lou Maysel wrote in his history of UT football, "Here Come the Texas Longhorns." Yet Baldwin recovered enough to finish second in the discus at the NCAA championships in 1928, and in 1929 he was the high-point performer at the SWC track and field championships, winning the shot and discus and finishing second in the high hurdles.

Baldwin's early departure from the team opened the way for Beard to get more playing time in 1929.

The Longhorns were undefeated heading into the Oklahoma game in Dallas. Although that neutral-site game is now a tradition, in 1929 Oklahoma was actually a stand-in for Vanderbilt, which had begun playing UT in Dallas in 1921 after Oklahoma joined the Missouri Valley Conference, which prohibited neutral-site games. When the conference relented, Oklahoma was again a natural fit.

Although it could hold 18,000 fans, Fair Park Stadium wasn't quite so ideal for the players; it didn't have adequate locker rooms.

"We dressed at the Adolphus Hotel, and we went out there in a taxicab," Beard said. "The driver got lost, but one of the boys in there, I guess it was (Gordy) Brown, he lived in Dallas, and he got us to the ballpark. When we got there, they wouldn't let us in because we didn't have tickets."

At the last minute, Beard said, Longhorn baseball coach Billy Disch arrived to help the players gain entrance to the stadium. "We just ran right out on the field. We didn't warm up at all; we were running in to start the kickoff," Beard said.
Brown, the team captain, recovered a fumble at the OU 4 to set up the final touchdown in a 21-0 win.

A 39-0 blanking of Rice vaulted Texas to 5-0 and extended the Longhorns' two-year shutout streak to eight games. Then it was back to Dallas.

"Our big rival when I was there was SMU. Didn't anybody like SMU, " Beard said. "The talk was they paid football players. At Texas there were no dormitories or training tables; everybody stayed on their own and took care of their own. SMU had training tables, and the boys got money for doing something or another."

SMU apparently had plenty of company. A few weeks before the Texas-SMU game, the reform-minded Carnegie Foundation released a shocking report on college athletics that said 84 of the 112 colleges it monitored had funds set aside to subsidize athletes, including Texas.

UT President H.Y. Benedict acknowledged that $1,200 was paid to athletes but said it was for work on campus that was actually done.
Texas and SMU were locked in a scoreless tie in the second half, and the Longhorns were on offense when Shelley approached Beard about a way to neutralize SMU's shifting defensive line.

"He said, 'Jim, cheat a little bit and get outside that tackle and block that line, and I'll take that end out of the flow back, and (Pap) Perkins can go right through there and walk through for a touchdown, and we'll win this ballgame.

"I slipped out about a half-yard farther than I (normally) did and took two steps out and cut back in and threw a left-side body block on the defense and stopped it. Shelley took out either the end or the linebacker, and there's a hole there that you could drive a truck through, and Perkins comes sailing up - and cut back right into the middle of the bunch and got piled up. I tell you, we liked to have died."

The game ended in a 0-0 standoff, as did the Horns' next contest against Baylor.
Texas' clash against Texas Christian brought one of the most memorable plays of that era, a 95-yard kickoff return for a touchdown by TCU speedster Cy Leland. Brown made a futile attempt to chase Leland down.

"Gordy got caught in the suction," Beard joked.

After the 15-12 loss, the Longhorns dropped the season finale against Texas A&M 13-0.
A few years later, when he was working in Fort Worth, Beard received a call from another Texas ex. Former Stanford great Ernie Nevers was coming to town with some all-stars. Could Beard play in that game?

"He said, 'You can get $100,' " Beard recalled. "I played both ways that day because they didn't have enough people."
As for the payout, Beard said, "I got two little bars of soap, which I took out of the restrooms."

Later, he said, he was approached a couple of times about joining the UT coaching staff.
"I didn't want to coach," Beard said. "There were so many players that were all-state that didn't amount to anything. They couldn't block, and they wouldn't tackle."

Like other UT fans, however, he likes to do some occasional armchair coaching - something he's been able to do now for 80 years.
jmaher@statesman.com; 445-3956



Jim B. Beard, Bryan Daily Eagle, October 13, 2009

Sept. 7, 1908 - October 10, 2009

Beloved husband, father, grandfather, and great-grandfather, James Blanton "Jim" Beard died at the age of 101 on Saturday, October 10, 2009, at his home in Bryan, Texas.

Visitation will be on Wednesday, October 14, 2009, from 4 p.m. to 7 p.m. at Memorial Funeral Chapel, 1515 S. College Ave., in Bryan. Funeral services will take place at 10:30 a.m. Thursday at First United Methodist Church in Bryan. Reverends Ernest E. Hunt III, Carroll Fancher, and Jeff Gage will officiate. A graveside service will take place at 3:30 p.m.. at the Austin Memorial Park, 2800 Hancock Drive, in Austin. Memorials may be made to the Bryan Public Library, 201 East 26st Street, Bryan, TX 77803.

Mr. Beard was born on September 7, 1908, in his parents' home in Austin, Texas. His parents were William DeWitt "Dick W." Beard and Elsie Mary Rutledge of Austin and Fort Worth, Texas. His paternal grandparents were James Willis Beard and Mary Jane Glenn Beard of Austin, and his maternal grandparents were John Walker Rutledge and Julia Elizabeth Anderson Rutledge also of Austin. Jim was a great-grandson of Thomas Anderson, builder of the Anderson Mill near Austin, Texas, and a former County Commissioner of Travis County. His great-uncle, William Pinckney Rutledge, was a captain in the army of the Republic of Texas and commanded a company during the Mexican Incursions of 1842.

Jim graduated from the University of Texas in 1931, where he majored in business. During his tenure at the University of Texas, he played on the football and baseball teams and lettered in football in 1929. Jim also played the entire 60 minutes of the first ever University of Texas-Oklahoma football game. On New Year's Day of 1930, he also played in the Dixie Classic. He was the oldest living "Longhorn" letterman at the time of his death.
<br><br>On December 31, 1932, Jim married Martha Louise Hunter in Fort Worth, Texas. Jim and Louise's marriage spanned sixty-nine years and his devotion to her never waivered. In fact, he chose to retire from his business at the age of 87 in order to care for Louise until she died nearly seven years later. Jim and Louise enjoyed traveling together to places like New Zealand, Australia, and Africa, but were always most interested in spending time with their three children and seven grandchildren. Above all, Jim and Louise were known for the unconditional love they showed to their family and the acts of kindness they displayed towards friends, employees, and people who had newly moved to town.

Jim was an avid reader, hunter, sportsman, and naturalist, and a lifetime devotee of college and professional football. He was a long-time member of the First United Methodist Church in Bryan, where he first joined in 1943. Jim greatly enjoyed his fourth generation heritage in the Methodist church and regularly found time to give back to it through his involvement with the Men's Bible Class and hosting annual Oyster Feed. In addition, he spent more than 20 years donating transportation and labor for the Bryan Carnegie Library's annual book sale. In 1986, he was honored for his service to the library with a ceremony, plaque, and special library card "No. 1". Jim also served on the "Texas Exes" Board of Directors.

Early in their marriage, Jim and Louise lived in several Texas cities while he worked for Sinclair as a district auditor. In 1942, he bought a small freight company in Bryan, which later became Beard Transfer and Storage and an agency for United Van Lines. Over the years, he acquired other United agencies in Temple and Amarillo, Texas. In the 1960's, Jim was elected to the Board of Directors for United Van Lines and served for twelve years.

Jim is survived by a sister, Mary Elizabeth "Tookie" Beard Sullivan of Fort Worth; three children, daughters, Elsie Hunt of Dallas, and Nancy Cochran of Austin, and a son, James Lealand Beard of Bryan; two sons-in-law, Revered Ernest E. Hunt III and James H. Cochran; one daughter-in-law, Darlynne Beard; six grandchildren, Ernest E. Hunt IV and his wife Holly, of New York City, Elizabeth Hunt-Blanc of Dallas, Christopher Martin McCollum of Memphis, Tennessee, Kevin Wayne McCollum and his wife Lisa, of Austin, Lucinda Michelle Beard and her husband Kenneth Hogan of Houston, and James Blanton Beard II and his wife Jennifer of Bryan; six great-grandchildren, Jose and Thomas Blanc, Tyler and Ethan McCollum, Elizabeth Caroline and Louisa Carter Hunt, and many nieces and nephews. He was preceded in death by his wife, Louise, their grandson Dick Blanton McCollum, his parents, his brother, Dick W. Beard, Jr. and sister, Winifred Helen Beard.


Eulogy Given October 15, 2009 by grandson Ernest E. Hunt IV:

James B. Beard 1908-2009

Some men are defined by the era in which they died, some in the era in which they came of age, but a rare few are defined by the era in which they was born into. My Grandfather, Jim Beard, was such a man.

In 1908, Teddy Roosevelt was president. The airplane and automobile had just been invented, and there was no limit to what you could do or become if you worked hard enough. It was an optimistic era of self-reliance untainted by wars or depression. The sky was the limit, or maybe not even that. As Jim once said, "I've gone from the horse and buggy era to a man landing on the moon." My grandparents were realistic, but highly optimistic people, and I always found being around them strengthened me. Though their philosophy of life was considered backwards and naïve by cynics, as I have grown older, I now see my grandparents were right all along.

My grandfather was a sickly child, who worked hard to become an athlete. He always had a keen sense of humor, honed by coming from a family of teasers. He never liked failure. My Aunt Mildred told me that when she was a child (she was only 4 years older than my grandfather), she played a card game with Jim, and his sisters Tookie and Helen. When he unexpectedly lost, he threw the table up in the air and said "you're all a bunch of cheaters". Mildred teased him about this all her life. But for Jim, failure was not an option.

My grandfather was a Roosevelt Republican, a Teddy Roosevelt Republican, all his life. Despite graduating from the University of Texas in 1931, he always said the Great Depression was not as bad as everyone said (at least in Texas), and always believed he voted for the right man in 1932, Herbert Hoover, instead of "the other Roosevelt". He married my grandmother on the last day of 1932, and they both worked and saved their money before having their first child, my mother, in 1938. While at Sinclair in the 1930's, Jim saved money by sleeping in his car, saving his hotel allowance to buy his Grandmother's land in Austin before her mortgage was foreclosed on. His uncomplaining, optimistic and entrepreneurial spirit, undiminished by the depression, led him to buying a small freight company in Bryan in 1942, that later became Beard Transfer and Storage.

The unexpected the loss of his mother in 1936 and his brother to a Kamikaze plane in World War II, did not diminish his spirit. He and my grandmother had two more children, Nancy and Jim, and he continued building his business, becoming an agent for United Van Lines expanding to agencies in Temple and Amarillo, Texas in the 1960s.

My first memories of him are from the early sixties, when I would visit he and my grandmother for ever increasing periods in the summer. I can see him now in his old office, now torn down, fedora always on his head, feet on his desk, shirttail out, talking to some other agent at United Van Lines about some VERY IMPORTANT issue.

His professional focus on getting cargo to its destination as quickly as possible spilled into his personal life. Going on a car trip with him meant no unnecessary stops. Once, when he was going on a trip to New Braunfels, Texas, his single-minded determination to get there, despite being on vacation, caused my grandmother to tell him to back off. Ever after, she would always refer to this trait of my grandfathers as "we've got to get to New Braunfels".

I later had the privilege of learning to hunt with him, and spent thirty years of Christmases going on our annual deer hunt until he stopped hunting at age 91. Although I wasn't with him when this happened, the best hunting story about Jim is when he was with a large hunting party, sleeping at night in a cabin in south Texas, he saw a rat on the rafters. He took his pistol and shot it dead, the surprised rat landing by someone's pillow. Luckily no heart attacks occurred with his fellow hunters.

My grandfather's love of reading, hunting, and football never diminished throughout his life. Though retired from hunting, he was voraciously reading books and watching football until only three weeks ago.

I remember when I got out of college and started my first job, he told me "Always do more than your asked to do". It has served me well all my career.

Throughout the 1970's, my grandfather's optimism never wavered. I remember how cynical people were in that era of gas rationing and a supposed "national malaise". My grandparents would hear none of this. Their old-fashioned philosophy of working hard, doing more than you are required to do, and optimism stood out like a sore thumb. But I found it more genuine than the mournful cynics of that era.

As he grew older, my grandfather's friends realized he was aging more slowly than his contemporaries. One of them told my grandmother: "When Jim was 25 he looked like he was fifty, when he was fifty he looked like he was fifty, and now he's 75 and he still looks like he's fifty!"

As I grew older, I found my grandparent's unwavering, optimistic and uncomplaining approach to life increasingly inspiring. Visiting them was always a way to get my strength back, no matter what difficulties I faced elsewhere.

The hardest day of my grandfather's life was in 2002 when he lost my grandmother. It took him a year to recover. But after that he returned to his optimistic, uncomplaining, and forward-looking disposition. He did admit to me in the last year or two that "the hardest part about getting old is not being able to do all the things you want to do." If he had a younger body, he would have been out buying more land or businesses.

In many ways, he was the most youthful man I ever met. Always positive, never complaining, and always forward-looking. Even after 101 years on this earth. Like Teddy Roosevelt, he inspired others to make the most of themselves. I'm sure all of you were inspired by him or you wouldn't be here. He certainly inspired me.
Martha Louise Hunter and James Blanton Beard had the following children:

+2464 i. Elsie Maryan Beard.
+2465 ii. Nancy Louise Beard.
+2466 iii. James Lealand Beard.