Submitted by
Louise Willison

LeRoy Verle Peters

Dr. LeRoy Verle Peters, longtime Ponca City resident, died Wednesday afternoon, Jan. 31, 2007, in Westminster Village, Ponca City. He was 83.

A prayer service has been scheduled for 7 p.m. Monday in the chapel of Miller-Stahl Funeral Service. The Mass of Christian Burial will be celebrated Tuesday, Feb. 6, at 10 a.m. in St. Francis Catholic Church with the Rev. John Michalicka of St. Mary's Catholic Church and the Rev. Joseph Vas of St. Francis Catholic Church as celebrants. Committal service with military honors and burial will follow in Newkirk Cemetery.

LeRoy Verle Peters was born Jan. 17, 1924, near Newkirk, the son of Earl LeRoy and Wilhelmena Charlotte Kahle Peters. He grew up on the farm and attended Pioneer Rural School, Kildare School and Ponca City High School where he graduated with the class of 1942. After graduation he was employed at Boeing Aircraft Plant in Wichita, Kan., assembling aircraft bomber tail sections for the war effort.

On June 12, 1945, LeRoy and Vineta Lorraine Tipton were married in Newkirk. He entered into active service with the United States Army July 25, 1945, and served four and one-half years in Military Intelligence as a special agent of the Counter Intelligence Corps with the Eighth Service Command in Dallas, Texas, and then the Fourth Army in Oklahoma City. While in Oklahoma City he and his wife attended night classes at the Oklahoma City College of Law. He was honorably discharged Nov. 18, 1949.

In 1949 he enrolled in Oklahoma A&M College in Stillwater and received his bachelor's degree in agronomy in 1952. He attended graduate school at the University of Nebraska, Lincoln, where he received his master's degree in 1954 and his doctorate in agronomy in 1958. He taught various courses in agronomy at the University of Nebraska, advised several hundred students and conducted research on forage crops from 1955 to 1964.

Dr. Peters was a sorghum breeder for Funks Hybrid Seed Company in Lubbock, Texas, from 1964 to 1967. He accepted an appointment with the USDA/US Agency for International Development as a geneticist, and worked on the improvement of the millets in Uganda, East Africa from 1967 to 1973. Dr. and Mrs. Peters were evacuated from Uganda near the end of their tour and returned to the USA where Dr. Peters joined Land O'Lakes in Iowa as a soybean breeder.

In 1977 Dr. Peters accepted a position as USAID crop production officer in Botswana, Southern Africa. Upon completion of this appointment in 1980, Dr. Peters returned to east Africa as a corn breeder in western Kenya on an agricultural research station at Kitale on the slopes of Mt. Elgon. In 1984 he accepted a position as agronomist/plant breeder in Sierra Leone, West Africa. One and one-half years later he accepted a position as USAID forage specialist in Belize, Central America where they worked from March 1986 until January 1989, when the couple returned to the USA and retirement in Ponca City. The success of their 17 years of agricultural improvement work in the developing world was most satisfying. New varieties of millet have been named in honor of Dr. Peters, recognizing his contributions in Uganda. LeRoy and Vineta have given over 40 slide presentations of their work and experiences in Africa and Central America to schools, social, religious and other various organizations.

Education was very important to Dr. and Mrs. Peters, and, during the times they lived outside of the United States, the Peters children received their education through the Calvert Correspondence School of Baltimore, Md., and the University of Nebraska extension courses for home schooling the younger children. As the children grew, they attended Notre Dame International and Marymount International boarding schools, both schools in Rome, Italy, providing a great experience for all of them.

Members of St. Mary's Catholic Church, the Peters sang in the church choir for weekly Mass and for many funerals. He served as scoutmaster for several sons in The Boy Scouts of America, and he was a member of the American Society of Agronomy. On occasion he enjoyed playing golf, and he helped with many of St. Mary's parish garage sales. He enjoyed working in his yard and garden, sharing his produce with many friends and family.

Surviving Dr. Peters are his wife of over 61 and a half years, Vineta; their six children and nine grandchildren: Dr. Lon and Marcia Peters of Portland, Ore., their daughters Megan (recently graduated from Brown University, currently residing in Asahi City, Japan), and Meredith (currently attending Mount Holyoke College); Lesa Peters and her husband Marc Kroll of Woodbury, Conn., and their sons Matthias Peters-Kroll (recently graduated from Franklin and Marshall College) and Nathaniel Peters-Kroll (currently attending Hobart and William Smith Colleges); Rex and Janice Peters of Fort Wayne, Ind., and their children Lyndsay (recently graduated from University of Dayton), Courtney (currently attending Bowling Green State University), and Christopher (currently attending Purdue University); Rian and Pamela Peters of Newkirk; Rod and Judy Peters and their daughter Caroline of Plano, Texas; and Loel Peters and Patti Reeder and their son Liam Peters of Modesto, Calif. Also surviving are two sisters, Velma Grose of Newkirk and Verna Rosebeary of Ponca City.

He was preceded in death by his parents; one brother, LaVerne E. Peters; and two sisters, Anna Lois Peters and Lorraine Salamone.

Those serving as casket bearers will be Darin Behara, Tim Stein, Joe Farley, Matthias Peters/Kroll, James Schaefer, Johnathan Schaefer, Justin Schaefer and Brian Fredricks.

The family will be at the Dean Peters residence, 1750 Pleasant View Road, Newkirk.

In lieu of flowers, the family has requested that contributions be made in Dr. Peters memory to the LeRoy and Vineta Peters Scholarship Fund, St. Mary's School, 415 S. Seventh St., P.O. Box 1330, Ponca City, Okla. 74602-1330