The Rev. Roy Poynor would have been the last person in the world to call himself a saint.

But when Don Bailey's joyful saxophone ended my dad's memorial service last month, everyone in attendance could rejoice he finally had been called "to be in that nyumber ....When the Saints Go Marching In."

I think Dad would have been a little uncomfortable with all the tributes paid to him by Methodist ministers Wes Hilliard, Guy Whitney and Bill Kelton, his good friend David Moore and in comments from friends and family read during the service. And I'm sure he would have speeded up the service if he could have.

Until his decline into Alzheimer's began nearly six years ago, my dad was a man of action. He didn't believe in wasting time, words or money and would tackle whatever job needed to be done head on and not quit until it was finished. He coud be impatient, stubborn and quick-tempered at times, but he couldn't abide indecision or putting things off. Even when consulting the Lord about every problem or burden, he believed, you just just "pray about it and move on."

The youngest and last surviving child of the Ernest and Laura Poynor family, my dad grew up in the Bailey Hill and Mill Creek areas of Fort Smith with five brothers – Pat, Ben, Amos, Joe and Carl – and three sisters – Margaret, Ella Mae and Chloe.

He had an infectious smile, sparkling blue eyes, a charming personality and he never knew a stranger. God, the Methodist Church, family, friends, food, music, hunting and fishing were Dad's great passions.

He always loved music, and not just the wonderful traditional hymns and gospel tunes he learned to sing in the Baptist and Methodist churches he attended as a boy. In his early teens, he was briefly the drummer and singer for a little combo that played in some area honky-tonks he was too young to be in and sometimes had to fight his way out of.

He loved Dixieland jazz, especially anything by Louis Armstrong – and '50s rock and R&B – especially anything by Ray Charles. I have wonderful memories of watching my dad enjoy the music at the New Orleans Jazz Festival in the 1990s, and of all of us listening to his Louis Armstrong albums together. In the early '50s, he took our family to Fayetteville to hear Armstrong and his All Stars perform and even got us backstage to meet "Satchmo."

In 1940, when he was 17 and the love of his life, Euneva Kidd, was 16, he convinced her – and both their mothers – that they were destined for each other and shouldn't wait any longer to get married. When Mother died in 2001, they were two months shy of celebrating their 61st anniversary.

In the fall of 1942, I was born, and a few months later Dad joined his five brothers already fighting World War II in the Navy, and served in the Philippines for nearly two years in heavy combat. Miraculously, he and all of his brothers came home alive.

After his discharge from the Navy in 1945, Dad put his electrician's mate rating to work for several Fort Smith electrical contractors, and in the late 1950s served as the city's electrical inspector. But his single most life-changing event came in 1946, when he "got the call to preach" and decided to become a Methodist minister. For the first 14 years of his ministry, he had to continue working full time to support his family, which eventually included my two brothers Roy II and Rob. In his "spare" time, he took college and seminary courses to meet the requirements for becoming an ordained minister.

In 1960, he accepted his first full-time conference appointment at Charleston's First Methodist Church, and made lifelong friends during the five years he and my family were there. He spent the last few years of his life in Charleston, too, lovingly cared for at Greenhurst, whose founder and current owners – and many of its staff members and residents – were people he had befriended or ministered to in the 1960s. As his Alzheimer's cruelly progressed, he couldn't remember them, but I believe he recognized their love and respect for him to the end.

During the 50 years my dad served the Lord and the Methodist Church, he and Mother experienced many blessings and hardships. But Dad never doubted his decision to become a minister, and wherever the church assigned him, he and Mother faithfully set about serving each congregation.

He was a great administrator for every church he served, too. His last major accomplishment before he retired from the full-time ministry in 1986, was working with the Rev. Guy Whitney to merge the congregations of two historic Van Buren Methodist churches – First Methodist and St. John's – into Heritage United Methodist – with a new building in the city's most rapidly growing part of town.

In more than 20 churches in Arkansas, Dad's ministry and spiritual guidance has influenced, and continues to influence, thousands of lives, including those of his children, his grandchildren and many other family members. He couldn't have left us a better heritage. And while he never claimed to be a saint here on earth, he's bona fide now, in Heaven.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Linda Seubold, editor of Entertainment Fort Smith Magazine, can be reached at lindaseubold@efortsmith.com. Read her archived columns and articles online.

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