Charles Lee Evans

Charles Lee Evans rose from a hardscrabble childhood in the Depression to serve his country in World War II, raise three sons with the pretty girl who turned his head and imprint generations of students while learning the ropes as a weekend rancher. He was an amazing and generous grandpa and great-grandpa, too.

Born in Weatherford on Feb. 24, 1924, to Rita A. and John Frederick Evans, Charles was reared from infancy by his mother and grandparents, Samuel Vincent and Mary Elizabeth Rust in Fort Worth, where Rita took Charles and his older brother, Fred, after it became clear their father was not dependable.

Charles learned to hunt dove at the side of his grandfather, whom he called, Dad, his entire life.

He grew up in the Polytechnic community of East Fort Worth shooting marbles, spinning tops and mastering yo-yo skills he would one day share with his sons. Charles always said no one in his neighborhood knew they were poor because they were all in the same situation.

He also told his sons, Dudley, Mark, and Glenn, about the head-to-toe poison ivy that put him in a boot camp hospital while his 64th Army Airborne Squadron shipped out without him, later suffering massive casualties in the Battle of the Bulge. Reassigned to the 63rd Airborne, Cpl. Evans drew his rifle once during the World War II, on guard duty in Hawaii when a cow ambled by one dark night.

Charles recalled in a memoir that he won $15 in a company pool for nailing June 6 as the date for the Allied Invasion at Normandy where his brother, Fred, was an offshore medic receiving casualties.

The GI Bill empowered Charles to enter college, an option he’d not envisioned as a young clerk before the war. And he earned a bachelor’s degree in education with a math minor from North Texas State University, now the University of North Texas. He later would achieve his doctorate degree in education there.

While an undergraduate, Charles continued a lifelong passion for singing, adding his tenor voice to barbershop quartets and choirs he’d joined since boyhood at Poly Baptist Church. Filling in one night for the director of a church youth choir in Denton, he met teacher-in-training Betty Jo Brown.

Within a year, the pair embarked on a 67-year partnership that yielded their three sons, five grandchildren and nine great-grandchildren.

Charles and Betty raised their family in East Fort Worth, Betty bowing out of the classroom while the children were little as Charles was promoted, first, from sixth-grade teacher at East Handley Elementary to Glencrest Elementary principal.

Charles began most mornings with the pushups and other calisthenics he learned in the Army, and in his final days he kept up a daily regimen with light hand weights.

The couple raised their boys ensconced in the American middle class, playing tennis with fellow school couples weekly, followed by ice cream at Ashburn’s on East Lancaster, and regular bridge nights when the ashtrays came out for the couple’s smoking friends.

By the mid-1970s, Charles proposed and became the first Director of Research and Evaluation for the Fort Worth Independent School District.

He held that position until retirement when he took on a role overseeing student teachers for the University of Texas at Arlington.

The promotion to FWISD administration, and another draw on the GI Bill, allowed Charles to purchase 67 acres in 1972, in Parker County where the Evans family had arrived from Arkansas in 1904. He became a weekend rancher under the tutelage of his Uncle Frank Evans, who ranched nearby, and his grass-fed beef fueled his family and fed countless friends.

Their sons off to college and careers, Charles and Betty took up dance lessons in the early 1980s. Many reading this recall the grace the Evanses exhibited at weddings, and Charlie’s three granddaughters will ever feel Grandpa’s arms on waltzes across the parquet floor of his den.

Charles’ family takes pride in much that he accomplished, but in nothing so much as one of the last things he learned — and mastered.

As Betty’s health wavered, her Charlie took on the role of primary caregiver. Putting his foot down, when Betty’s doctor discharged her from a hospital stay to a nursing home, he brought her to the house they’d shared since 1958 where she lived her final years knowing just how loved she’d always been.

Betty passed in her sleep nine months ago, holding Charlie’s hand. Her husband followed her peacefully, at Mark’s House, on June 7, 2018.

In addition to his sons, Charles is survived by daughters-in-law Jan Evans (Dudley) and Bonnie Evans (Mark); grandchildren Sarah Evans, Jennie LaBuhn, Katie McCombs, Will Evans and Steven Evans; and great-grandchildren, Sydney LaBuhn, River Ovsen, Abigael LaBuhn, Celeste Ovsen, Lilly LaBuhn, James McCombs Jr., Bryan Griffiths, Bridget Evans and John McCombs; and a host of loving nephews and nieces.