By David Wilfong
Herald-Banner Staff
The Royse City Independent School District took a turn of sorts when deciding what to name its newest campus.
Whereas other schools in the district are named for former educators, Harry H Herndon Intermediate was named for a much-loved student who went off to Vietnam and never came home.
Harry H Herndon was born on Aug. 5, 1947, the third of four sons to J.E. (Burr) Herndon and Irma Wyatt Herndon. He attended all 12 years at RCISD and graduated from RCHS in 1965.
Herndon entered the army on Oct. 19, 1967. During his service, Herndon was awarded many medals, including both the Purple Heart and Bronze Star which were awarded posthumously.
He was only 21 years old when he was killed in action on Oct. 19, 1968.
RCISD held a dedication ceremony for the new school on Sunday.
Herndon Principal Shanna Brown addressed the gathered crowd and said it was an honor to have been chosen to open the new school.
“It has become even more of an honor as I’ve learned about Mr. Herndon,” Brown said. She invited the attendees to see the memorabilia at the school’s entrance, including old football photos from Herndon’s days as a Bulldog.
“You will even see some familiar faces,” Brown said. “Some board members that were football players.”
Brown has named the school’s mascots “Heroes.” She explained that the word stood for Honest, Encouraging, Respectful, Optimistic, Excellent and Successful. She added that the motto was repeated every morning at the school.
She then introduced the Herndon “Treble-Maker Choir.” The choir sang “Gonna Build a Mountain,” and then the official Army song in tribute to Herndon.
Bobby Summers was the school board member Brown referred to from the football photos. Summers spoke to the audience on behalf of his childhood friend.
“Wow, I know Harry has that giant smile on his face right now,” Summers began. “This is certainly a day of celebration and a day that the Royse City School District can always be proud of. Today, I want to spread some good news and I want everyone that is here today to remember who, what and why we remembered a young man that gave it all 41 years ago next month.”
Summers then painted a picture of Royse City as it was in the days Herndon was a student. He went on to describe the entire family that Herndon came from.
“All of the boys were as tough and resilient as the black soil they worked,” Summers said. “They all enjoyed playing baseball and football and they all would play football for the Royse City Bulldogs. In those days and those times everybody in Royse City knew everybody. Kids could not get ‘out of line’, you might say, because of the watchful eye of their neighbor.”
Summers later would add that at one stretch, the Royse City Bulldog football team contained five sets of brothers on a team of less than two dozen players.
Summers also recalled some of the stories of misfortune that the family had to endure.
“There was the time Harry had to load his 7-year-old younger brother into an ambulance because he was accidently run over by a combine,” Summers said. “To make matters worse while they followed the ambulance to Dallas, Harry watched in disbelief as that same ambulance was picked up by a tornado and sent the opposite direction from the hospital.
”It would be just a matter of time that lightning would strike the Herndon family with retribution. The hearts of the family and the community would be destroyed with confusion, emptiness, grief and sorrow.”
Since the time of the internet, Summers said he was able to make a connection within the military. While searching for the Vietnam memorial wall, he was able to make contact with a comrade of Herndon’s online.
“About a year ago, I was thinking about the Herndon family and what they meant to my life,” Summers said. “I had never been to the Vietnam Memorial in Washington, D.C. and I was curious that with all of the technology we have at our fingertips nowadays that could I possibly pull up the Memorial on line and search for Harry’s name inscribed on the wall. Sure enough, it was right there before me and I began to read some messages left on the website. One wrote they were Harry’s friend and how much they missed him and yet another that described their friendship with him as well. I recognized the two names that left the kind words.
“However, there was another that I did not recognize. It was by a Lt. John Snapp. Lt. Snapp left a brief message as he remembered Harry and another soldier, Michael Saporito of Valley Stream, New York.”
Summers contacted Snapp and discovered the message was left by Herndon’s commanding officer, who remembered well the day that Herndon died. According to Snapp, Herndon and the other soldier were hit by shrapnel from a booby-trapped land mine that they tripped up when going to scout out an old French fort on a day marked by a heavy downpour.
“I called in a Medivac and the helicopter crew risked their lives to fly in such bad weather; they followed the dirt road at about 10 feet above ground level until they found us,” Summers read from Snapp’s e-mail. “ It only took less than 30 minutes for the helicopter to arrive.
“Our medic (wish I could recall his name) worked on Harry the entire time and jumped on the Medevac to continue to try to save him on the flight to the hospital. Sadly no one could save him.”
Summers said that he was struck when Herndon’s name came up in the process of selecting who to honor with the new campus.
“On that day and in that meeting that we opened the suggestions and the name of Harry H Herndon was nominated, I began to swell with every emotion possible,” Summers said. “I am proud to say that now with this school, the hope still lives and the dream shall never die.
