Palestine High School Alumni Association

Ronald Ray Calhoun 1961 Born 01-23-1943 Died 07-19-2004 Age 61

01 / 23 / 1943  –  07 / 19 / 2004

Ronald Ray Calhoun, 61, of Palestine passed away July 19, 2004 at East Texas Medical Center in Tyler surrounded by family and friends. He succumbed to injuries suffered in the crash of his airplane a day earlier in Houston County.

Ron was born January 23, 1943 in Seminole, Oklahoma, the son of the late Simon L. and Alpha Wingo Calhoun.

He is survived by his loving wife of 39 years, Nikki Roquemore Calhoun of Palestine; his son and daughter-in-law, Cameron Taylor Calhoun and Heather of The Woodlands; granddaughter, Hallie Grace Calhoun; brothers, Simon E. Calhoun of Alabama, Fred G. Calhoun of Jacksboro, David L. Calhoun of Rockwall, and Don D. Calhoun of Euless.

He graduated from Palestine High School in 1961, North Texas State University In 1965 with a BA degree, and from Sam Houston State University in i967 with an MBA degree.

He was retired from Palestine Contractors and was a member of the First Presbyterian Church.

Above all Ron loved his family and friends. He took great joy in his granddaughter, Hallie Grace. He loved flying, skiing, golf, scuba diving, and photography.

Visitation with the family will be at Bailey & Foster Funeral Home. Services will be held at 1 p.m. Thursday at First Presbyterian Church with the Rev. Tom Loden officiating.

Interment will follow at Roselawn Park under the direction of Bailey & Foster.

Source: Palestine Herald-Press 07-20-2004

“The original good guy”
7-20-2004
By Paul Stone
H-P Associate Editor

A lifelong friend remembered Ronald R. Calhoun who passed away at a Tyler hospital Monday from injuries sustained in a weekend airplane crash as “the original good guy.”

Calhoun, 61, died Monday afternoon at a Tyler hospital after suffering massive injuries when his private plane crashed during takeoff from a Houston County airport around 1:30 p.m. Sunday.

Services for Calhoun are pending at Bailey & Foster Funeral Home in Palestine.

Calhoun, a 1961 Palestine High School graduate, started taking flying lessons roughly 40 years ago, according to longtime friend Roger Henderson.

“He had been flying a long time,” Henderson said.

Calhoun’s personally-built airplane crashed shortly after takeoff from Bruner’s Airport in Latexo, approximately 6 miles north of Crockett, around 1:30 p.m. Sunday, according to authorities.

“During takeoff, the canopy of the aircraft came open approximately 50-to-100 feet off of the runway,” Texas Department of Public Safety spokesperson Tela Mange told the Herald-Press this morning. “The aircraft took a sharp left turn and crashed approximately 1,000 feet from the south end of the runway.”

Calhoun was subsequently transported to East Texas Medical Center in Tyler “with severe facial injuries,” according to Mange

A DPS report described Calhoun’s plane as “an experimental aircraft,” the spokesperson said. Weather conditions were listed as “clear and cloudy” at the time of the crash on the same report.

DPS Trooper Jeff Berry, who is based in Crockett, investigated the accident, according to Mange.

This morning Henderson said Calhoun had spent approximately 17 years constructing a “RV-4” airplane and had been flying it for a relatively short period of time.

A Web site maintained by Van’s Aircraft described the RV-4 as a “kit plane” accommodating two people and their baggage.

Henderson said he was a year younger than Calhoun, but that they had played football and baseball together at Palestine High School and later attended Sam Houston State University in Huntsville at the same time.

The men also later teached math in the Killeen Independent School District as young adults in the late 1960s and then worked together for 20 years at Palestine Contractors, he added.

Calhoun also spent some time in the U.S. Army reserves as a paratrooper, according to Henderson.

“Ronnie was the original good guy,” Henderson said this morning. “He was a straight arrow about everything. He’s exactly what you think of as a gentleman.”

Henderson recalled his introduction to the game of golf when both were attending college at Sam Houston.

“He took me out to the golf course and bought me golf clubs,” Henderson remembered. “I think just so he’d have somebody to beat all the time.”

Nancy Clark and her husband, Harry, also have been longtime friends of Calhoun and his wife, Nikki Calhoun, who retired last month as principal at Southside Elementary School.

“He was just a wonderfully fine man,” Nancy Clark said this morning. “He had a wonderful sense of humor. You wouldn’t know it unless you knew him for a while. He turned to jelly when his grandchild (Hallie Grace Calhoun who turns 1 in September) was born. We will just miss him more than I can say.”

Source: Palestine Herald-Press 07-20-2004