OVESTA ELLEN McCLESKEY CLAY, 90, of Fort
Worth, TX, died on June 21, 2001. She was born on
July 7, 1910 to James T. McCleskey. Her mother was
Sula Langford who died in 1926. Hattie McCleskey was
her step-mother. Ovesta attended Ranger High School
in the Class of 1928 at Ranger, TX and married Comer
Clay who later died in 2006. Her sister is Emma Leta
McCleskey Bonner (RHS-1939).
HUSBAND: E. COMER CLAY, 95, a native of Abilene,
TX died on Feb. 3, 2006, with burial at Mount Zion
Cemetery in Stephens County.
A former professor at Texas Christian University, Mr.
Clay was a teacher, a soldier, a scholar of government
and politics and a person who knew the value of water
conservation, every drop of it. He had a strong mind
and a big heart -- someone who could have been a lawyer
but decided to make less money and teach kids instead.
Mr. Clay also could have sidestepped service during
World War II because of his age and his pressing
responsibilities at an Abilene school. But he enlisted
anyway.
Mr. Clay was born Dec. 22, 1910 to the late Valley Hill
and E. Comer Clay. He graduated from Abilene High School
in 1927, received his Bachelor of Arts degree from Abilene
Christian College in 1931 and his master of arts degree
from the University of Texas in 1937. He married Ovesta
McCleskey in Abilene in 1937.
Mr. Clay was 31 and a high school teacher when, in 1942,
he enlisted in the Army and joined the war, in which he
became a decorated soldier. At the end of his four years
of duty, he enlisted in the Army Reserves and in the Texas
Army National Guard, in which, in 1963, he earned the
rank of full colonel.
It was during his 28-year tenure at TCU, from 1948 to 1976,
that Mr. Clay gained a reputation as a professor determined
to teach his students about government and political science,
whether they wanted to learn or not.
He was preceded in death by his wife of 64 years, Ovesta
McCleskey; and his sisters, Hettie Logan Newman and Mary
Ellen Johnson.
Mr. Clay is survived by his daughter, Linda Hoffer, and her
husband, Bud; and two grandchildren, Tyson Clay Hoffer and
Allison Hoffer Castillo.