Meet Our Donors - Basil and Dale Hicks

Tradition and duty. For Basil and Dale Hicks, they are more than words -- they embody their commitment to Lyon College and a Presbyterian education.

The Hickses are doing what they consider their duty by funding a scholarship at Lyon. The endowed scholarship is named after Basil's parents, Clyde and Delpha Beasley Hicks. That scholarship fund will grow in the future through two gift annuities the Hickses have established, one through the Texas Presbyterian Foundation and one through Lyon College, as well as contributions from other family members.

"I believe God gave me what I have, and I have to return part of that for a good use," said Basil Hicks, a retired Presbyterian minister who now resides in Little Rock, Ark. "I believe in education. Most of the first 100 colleges were started by the Presbyterian and Methodist churches, mostly by the Presbyterians because they've always had an emphasis on education."

While the Presbyterian church has historically supported education, the Hickses and their family have historically supported a Presbyterian education.

Basil is a 1940 graduate of Lyon, then Arkansas College. Dale is an alumnae of Agnes Scott College in Georgia. Basil's brothers, Roy and Doin, graduated from Lyon, as did their wives, Maxine and Wanda. Basil and Dale's niece, Melissa, is also a Lyon graduate. Each of Basil and Dale's children also graduated from a Presbyterian school.

Besides making gifts to the College, Basil Hicks served his alma mater as a member of the board of trustees and as president of the alumni council.

Basil Hicks came to Lyon on the recommendation of Dr. John Crockett. At the time, Crockett was a frequent preacher on a church circuit in southern Missouri where Hicks lived. Crockett, who would later become president of Arkansas College, found out Hicks was considering entering the ministry and recommended Arkansas College as the best place he knew to prepare a young man for the ministry.

Basil Hicks went on to Columbia Theological Seminary in Georgia and spent more than 40 years as a full-time and interim pastor.

Lyon is grateful that the tradition of quality higher education will be available to young men and women through the generosity of the Hicks family.