Mention the name “Leroy Parsons” to just about anyone who attended Seminole Public Schools from 1974 – 1998, and their face will likely light up.

Parsons, a longtime elementary science teacher, taught his pupils not only in the classroom, but also in the great outdoors. He is synonymous with “Camp Goddard,” where every September for about two decades, he took a group of sixth graders to teach them about the environment.

The beloved educator spent years teaching lessons from a schoolbook, and he now has a book of his own. About three months ago, Twice Blessed, a compilation of Parsons-penned poems and short stories, was published.

In his second year at Camp Goddard, Parsons began writing. His early musings were mostly whimsical, but over time, they took on a somber tone. On Aug. 22, 1986, his son, Randy, was tragically electrocuted while fishing at a lake in rural Seminole County.

Randy had attempted to move a fallen electrical line, unaware that it was still live. He was found dead on the grass beside the lake, clutching his fishing pole in one hand and the electric line in the other. Randy, still in his mid-20s, left behind his wife, Michelle, and their six-month-old daughter, Heather.

“During my second year at Camp Goddard, I began to write silly things about camp to the ‘Beverly Hillbillies’ melody and sing them to the kids. It was a hit, and it became a tradition for the next 18 years,” Parsons said. “I wrote my first serious poem two days after Randy died.”

Following is Parson’s poem, “Why?” written Aug. 24, 1986:

The young too often are taken, from those who hold them dear. They’re here awhile, then gone too soon, for reasons never clear.

We stand and cry and ask the moon, and all the stars above, why must we lose a part of us, this precious child we love.

Can this just be a quirk of fate, an aimless accident, or was a plan so carefully made, before the child was sent?

The question has no answer, no one the mystery solves, the grieved ones will the word repeat, while still the earth revolves.

Each one must search his own heart, to find what’s waiting there, is God’s true love welling up, or is it great despair?

The sorrow overwhelms one, when forced to stand alone, but sheltered in God’s tender care the answer can be known.

In God’s own time, we will know why, the answer to our sorrow, it may not be for years to come, I pray God for tomorrow.

The book also contains writings about Parsons’ first wife, Linda, and his second wife, Carol, both of whom succumbed to cancer. “God was glorified in both Linda’s and Carol’s lives,” Parsons wrote on the book’s back cover. “I just got an opportunity to help others through their stories.”

Parsons grew up in a “loving, Christian farm family” in Seminole and attended Varnum Public Schools for twelve years, then began studying education at East Central University. Along the way to higher education, he married Linda and had two children, Randy and Janelle, which stretched the time to six years. After college, Parsons gathered his family and headed to the Gallup, New Mexico area of the Navajo Reservation to teach.

Ten years in Gallup were interrupted by two years at Fort Hall Shoshone-Bannock Reservation in Idaho. The terminal illness of Linda’s father brought the family back to Seminole, where 24 years of teaching ended with his retirement to Eureka Springs, Arkansas. That story is told in the book.

While in Arkansas, Parsons taught Bible history at the Great Passion Play Bible Museum and was a cast member in the play for three years after Carol’s death.

In May 2018, he moved back to Oklahoma to live with Janelle, whose husband unexpectedly passed away in December 2016. “We both rely on God for grace, mercy, and guidance,” Parsons said.

Twice Blessed is available from Amazon and at Barnes and Noble in Oklahoma City.