Dr. Roy Leamon

In Memorium

The death of Dr. Roy Leamon left a void in the lives of many -- his family, his many friends, his colleagues and patients, and even casual acquaintances who recognized him as being a special and unique spirit.

The original appreciation, written while he was alive and posted on this site, can be found here. A memory book put together by his colleagues at HealthSouth Rehabilitation Hospital of Austin can be found here. If you would like to add your own remembrances, please send them via this link.

The following obituary appeared in the Austin American Statesman and the Lufkin News.

Dr. Roy Leslie Leamon of Austin, age 71, died after a battle with cancer and congestive heart failure on August 18, 2001. Born January 16, 1930 in Mexia, Texas to Lessie Spearman and Roy Leslie Leamon, Sr., Roy lost his mother at age 6 and his father at age 14, and moved to Pittsburg, Texas to live and work on his grandfather's farm until he left to attend San Marcos Academy.

Roy attended Baylor University as an undergraduate and medical student, and did his residency in Houston at Hermann Hospital. He married Elizabeth Pederson in 1960, and moved to Lufkin, Texas to establish his practice as the only orthopedic surgeon in the area. In 1962 his son Roy Leslie Leamon III was born, followed in 1963 by Rebecca Elizabeth and in 1965 by Michael Marion. He was an avid hunter, fisherman and horseman, collecting many big game trophies including moose, caribou, antelope, deer, bighorn sheep, and grizzly bear.

He was chief of staff at Lufkin Memorial Hospital, and was elected to the Lufkin City Commission. In 1972, the Leamon family moved to Austin, where Roy set up a new orthopedic practice and soon became a valued member of the Austin medical community, including serving on the Quality Assurance Team of Austin's Emergency Medical Services. After his divorce in 1974, he married Alda Hancock and took up scuba diving and underwater photography in such locales as Belize, Bonaire, Cayman Islands and the Red Sea. He became a scuba instructor and added hyperbaric medicine to his medical practice, serving as the medical director of the first multiplace hyperbaric chamber in Austin and as the first president of the Gulf Coast Chapter of the Undersea Medical Society.

For the last decade of his life, Dr. Leamon was Director of Orthopedic Rehabilitation at Healthsouth Rehabilitation Hospital of Austin. He received the Medical Director of the Year award in 2000, which paid tribute to his outstanding loyalty and commitment to patients and staff. In further recognition of his expertise and dedication, the Roy L. Leamon Living Legend award has been created that will honor extraordinary achievement at Healthsouth annually.

Dr. Leamon inspired his family and friends with his love of the outdoors, taking them on many adventures on land and undersea. In addition to his other hobbies, he was an avid outdoor photographer throughout his life, traveling to many remote American wilderness areas with his Hasselblad camera. His work can be seen at www.leamon.com. In recent years, he enjoyed the company of his "17-year-old redheaded mistress" Sally, a Tennessee Walker horse he loved riding in the Central Texas countryside.

Dr. Leamon's accomplishments are made all the more remarkable considering his health problems throughout his adult life. In his medical practice, his empathetic bedside manner was aided by his experience of his own health challenges, which included heart disease, corneal transplants, joint replacement and prostate cancer. In his medical residency, he was diagnosed with rheumatoid arthritis that temporarily confined him to a wheelchair. His mentors informed him that his disease would make a medical career in orthopedics unlikely. As it turns out, Dr. Leamon practiced up until three days before his death.

Friends and family will miss Roy tremendously. His generosity of spirit, unconditional love, goodness of heart, famous sense of humor, and passion for life touched everyone he met. A devoted father, Dr. Leamon was the source of support, spirit, inspiration and fun, and considered his children his proudest accomplishments. We feel infinitely blessed to have had him as our Dad. He is survived by his children Roy, Rebecca and Michael, close friends Kathryn Hayes, Stefanie Federlin, Denean Knapp, Tim and Elizabeth Ruefli, and many others.