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My wife Gayle and I moved to Fairfield 5 years ago in April of 2013. We left Harlingen, Tx where I had worked at Valley Baptist Family Medicine residency for 15 years. I am a native Texan from the small panhandle town of Stratford, Tx, where I grew up on a farm and ranch. Both sides of my family were pioneer farmers to the Texas panhandle in the early 1900’s.  The key part of my life started with my faith in Jesus Christ and my desire to follow him in career and work.  I went to undergraduate at Howard Payne University in Brownwood, Tx and it was there that I met my wife Gayle.

I went to medical school at UT Southwestern in Dallas and took a scholarship with the Navy to pay for medical school.  I decided on family medicine as a specialty to have the broadest base of training for medical mission work and went to residency at Naval Hospital Jacksonville, FL. After completing my work as a family physician for the Navy, I entered an advanced women’s care fellowship with the University of Tennessee in Memphis and was faculty with the family medicine department. We had thought we would then move into full time medical mission work outside the US but due to family illnesses we were directed in new plan.

We were led to be a part of a new residency program in family medicine starting at Valley Baptist Hospital in Harlingen, Tx with an emphasis on mission outreach and discipleship. We had a great 15 years working and serving in this training and mission outreach along the border and in Mexico.

We ended our work at the residency program and left Harlingen to me more centralized and available to our kids and grandkids in these next years. We have 4 children, and now 2 son in laws and one daughter in law and 11 grandchildren.

Gayle spent the first years of our kids’ lives at home and then entered the education field as a high school English teacher. After six years as a teacher, she desired to be involved in administration and teacher support. She worked as a HS assistant principal at La Feria HS and then when we moved here took the job as HS principal for Kerens. Last year she began work as the chief academic officer at Rappaport Charter school in Waco.

Two summers ago, we had the opportunity to serve in Kenya at a mission hospital and look forward to more overseas mission opportunities.

We have really enjoyed Fairfield and setting down new roots here in this area, it has been ideal for our family. We look forward to what God is calling us too in the days ahead.