Remembering Dr. Bryan Baker
Starkville lost one of its finest citizens this week with the passing of a true southern gentleman, Dr. Bryan Baker, former head of the Department of Animal Science at Mississippi State University. His official portrait hangs in the Vet School to recognize his many professional achievements. The large crowd at its dedication in 2011 is a testament to how beloved he was.
Dr. Baker taught my father endocrinology, but I didn’t know him professionally. He was simply my friend, despite an age difference of more than 40 years. He was a charter member of the Kiwanis Club of Starkville, established in 1964, and he insisted that I call him Bryan when I joined the club. Bryan was a brilliant man who never took himself too seriously.
One of the most memorable Kiwanis programs ever was when Bryan told about landing in Normandy on June 12, 1944, six days after D-Day, seeing body bags and carnage on the beach. He did his part as one of the greatest generation.
We had a mutual friend in Governor William Winter, who Bryan described as “my closest white neighbor growing up in Grenada County.” They were lifelong friends, and both were early advocates of public education and racial reconciliation.
About 10 years ago, Bryan spoke to my son Andrew’s Cub Scout den about life as a boy during the Great Depression. Bryan brought a photograph of himself with an African American boy, arm in arm, both smiling on his front porch in the 1930s. Bryan said they were inseparable playmates.
Andrew innocently asked if they went to school together. Bryan’s eyes got moist and his voice choked as he recounted how his path led him to a Ph.D., but his boyhood friend’s opportunities for education were limited. He told the boys that racial segregation was wrong and that it had hurt our state.
On a lighter note, Bryan also educated them about something they knew nothing about: an outhouse in rural Mississippi. This group of unruly boys sat silent and still as Bryan recalled the utility of corn cobs, especially the part about saving the light-colored cobs to ensure the job was done.
Perhaps the time I’ll cherish most is a day trip in 2010 when Bryan took Andrew and me to see his boyhood home and hunting camp in the Delta. Beside him in his truck and over lunch at the Crystal Grill in Greenwood, he regaled us with tales that were etched in his memory. But he also made a point to stop in Money at the infamous sight of the dilapidated building that had housed the store where Emmett Till had whistled at a white woman, with fatal results. This white man in his late eighties wanted Andrew to see it and know about our state’s civil rights history.
Bryan was a major patron of the Starkville Theater and active in First United Methodist Church. He had numerous friends and countless students who could all tell admiring stories about his character and his influence. The ripple effect of his life lives on through them.
Charlie Weatherly, another charter member of Kiwanis, spoke at the portrait dedication in 2011 and used a fitting quote from Albert Schweitzer to describe Bryan Baker. “So many people gave me something or were something to me without knowing it... I always think that we all live, spiritually, by what others have given us in the significant hours of our life. These significant hours do not announce themselves coming but arrive unexpected.”
Bryan Baker lived a life of significance that made our community, our university and our state a better place.
Brother Rogers is a guest columnist for the Starkville Daily News.
Dr. Baker taught my father endocrinology, but I didn’t know him professionally. He was simply my friend, despite an age difference of more than 40 years. He was a charter member of the Kiwanis Club of Starkville, established in 1964, and he insisted that I call him Bryan when I joined the club. Bryan was a brilliant man who never took himself too seriously.
One of the most memorable Kiwanis programs ever was when Bryan told about landing in Normandy on June 12, 1944, six days after D-Day, seeing body bags and carnage on the beach. He did his part as one of the greatest generation.
We had a mutual friend in Governor William Winter, who Bryan described as “my closest white neighbor growing up in Grenada County.” They were lifelong friends, and both were early advocates of public education and racial reconciliation.
About 10 years ago, Bryan spoke to my son Andrew’s Cub Scout den about life as a boy during the Great Depression. Bryan brought a photograph of himself with an African American boy, arm in arm, both smiling on his front porch in the 1930s. Bryan said they were inseparable playmates.
Andrew innocently asked if they went to school together. Bryan’s eyes got moist and his voice choked as he recounted how his path led him to a Ph.D., but his boyhood friend’s opportunities for education were limited. He told the boys that racial segregation was wrong and that it had hurt our state.
On a lighter note, Bryan also educated them about something they knew nothing about: an outhouse in rural Mississippi. This group of unruly boys sat silent and still as Bryan recalled the utility of corn cobs, especially the part about saving the light-colored cobs to ensure the job was done.
Perhaps the time I’ll cherish most is a day trip in 2010 when Bryan took Andrew and me to see his boyhood home and hunting camp in the Delta. Beside him in his truck and over lunch at the Crystal Grill in Greenwood, he regaled us with tales that were etched in his memory. But he also made a point to stop in Money at the infamous sight of the dilapidated building that had housed the store where Emmett Till had whistled at a white woman, with fatal results. This white man in his late eighties wanted Andrew to see it and know about our state’s civil rights history.
Bryan was a major patron of the Starkville Theater and active in First United Methodist Church. He had numerous friends and countless students who could all tell admiring stories about his character and his influence. The ripple effect of his life lives on through them.
Charlie Weatherly, another charter member of Kiwanis, spoke at the portrait dedication in 2011 and used a fitting quote from Albert Schweitzer to describe Bryan Baker. “So many people gave me something or were something to me without knowing it... I always think that we all live, spiritually, by what others have given us in the significant hours of our life. These significant hours do not announce themselves coming but arrive unexpected.”
Bryan Baker lived a life of significance that made our community, our university and our state a better place.
Brother Rogers is a guest columnist for the Starkville Daily News.