FRIENDS WE’LL MISS
unt alumni, faculty, staff and students are the university’s greatest legacy. When members of the Eagle family pass, they are remembered and their spirit lives on. Send information about deaths to the North Texan (see contact information on page 7).
1950s
1960s
JANE MCGINNIS RUSSELL (’50), Monroe, Louisiana. She attended North Texas as a member of the Demonstration School and went on to earn her bachelor’s degree in home economics with minors in music and art. She earned her master’s degree in education from Northeast Louisiana State University. She taught in Dallas schools and volunteered for the Monroe Symphony. She is preceded in death by her father Andrew Cleveland (1910), mother Jeffie Clayton McGinnis (1911) and brother Andrew Clayton McGinnis (’53). She was a member of the Matthews Society.
J. SCOTT HOLYFIELD (’60), Dallas. He was a certified public accountant, former treasurer of Braniff Airways, executive vice president of an independent oil and gas company, and owner of the Aw Shucks/Blue Goose restaurant group. A member of the President’s Council, he was a generous contributor to the G. Brint Ryan College of Business.
EDDIE JOHN DEES, SR. (’54), Santa Anna. He was a gifted pianist and arranger and led his band, The Eddie Dees Combo, in the 1960s and 1970s. He later earned his master’s degree in special education and his doctorate in pastoral counseling and worked as a school counselor in Texas for many years. A master of all trades, Eddie also started a home/business security company and renovated several of his homes. His wife Jatis P. Dees (’53), also a pianist and educator, preceded him in death in 2018. All three of their children — Layle, Eddie Jr. and Lynne (’75, ’80 M.F.A.) — attended UNT.
56 north TEXAN
LARRY MCMURTRY (’58), Archer City. One of America’s best-known authors of Western fiction, including contemporary Texas, McMurtry wrote more than 30 novels, as well as essay collections, memoirs, histories and screenplays. In 1961, he published his first book, Horseman Pass By, which became the movie Hud. One of his most famous works, Lonesome Dove, won a Pulitzer Prize in 1986 and the story later was adapted into a beloved TV miniseries. Other bestsellers include The Last Picture Show and Terms of Endearment, which also were adapted into Oscar-winning films. He co-wrote the Brokeback Mountain screenplay, for which he shared a Golden Globe and an Oscar in 2006. In 2014, he received the National Humanities Medal and was honored at the White House. At North Texas, he wrote for the Avesta literary magazine. He won the Distinguished Alumnus Award in 1986. His bookstore, Booked Up, was associated with UNT’s Mayborn Graduate Institute of Journalism’s Archer City Writers Workshop and writers were invited to meet with him at his home or at the store.
| northtexan.unt.edu | Fall 2021
TONY GOOLSBY (’61), Dallas. He attended UNT after serving in the U.S. Army, graduating with a degree in elementary education. He ran a small insurance agency for more than 20 years in Dallas, and also worked as a teacher, coach, principal and pharmaceutical representative. Tony was elected to the Texas House of Representatives in 1988. He and his wife, Toppy, dedicated the Goolsby Chapel to UNT in 2001, and Tony created the AT&T Tony Goolsby Student Award Fund for UNT in 2004. Tony also was a member of the Kendall Society and a brother in UNT’s Delta Phi Chapter of Theta Chi Fraternity. CHARLES OXFORD (’60), Sulphur Springs. After graduating with a marketing degree, he served in the U.S. Army for two years. Charles worked at Lehn & Fink in New Jersey as the vice president of sales before moving to Arkansas and owning three businesses. He later moved back to Texas and served on the Sulphur Springs City Council. Charles donated generously
