This is about a fantastic lady who has influenced many young people’s lives here in Lampasas, even though she is not a native. She was born in Sitka, Ark., but came to Fort Hood with her parents when she was six. She attended Killeen schools and graduated there in 1960. In the fall that year she married Donnie Dyer.

The Dyers moved to Lampasas as a family in 1966, moved away in 1970 and returned to Lampasas in 1980. Daughter Donna graduated from Athens High School in 1980, married and moved away. Daughter DeNae lives at home and works at a sheltered workshop sponsored by MHMR in Copperas Cove. Donnie passed away in 1999.

So far, sounds like no one extraordinary. But Susie is extraordinary. She never boasts or brags of what she has done to help special-needs children since 1983 when she became a coach for Special Olympics. She is certified in bowling, athletics and aquatics.

Susie pursued this calling due to her younger daughter DeNae, who was in the Lampasas LifeSkills class and graduated from LISD in May 1988, just prior to my tenure at LifeSkills.

As many parents want to be involved in their children’s lives, so did Susie for DeNae. She started out helping Lavica Anderson, who was the local LifeSkills teacher here for several years, then Joyce Lasko White for two years, Bill Rundzier for one year and then me for 21 years.

Susie was a Special Olympics coach starting in 1983, and then became head of the delegation in 1985. She was employed by LISD in 1983 at the middle school cafeteria; starting in 1984 she was manager of the snack bar at Lampasas High School.

In 1993 she started driving a bus and then in 1994 she came part time to help Neta Schaub and me at middle school LifeSkills. Susie worked for 13 years in that capacity, helping so many special-needs children in the classroom. She continued to coach bowling and athletics up until April 2009. She has not retired from LISD, though. She continues to drive a special-needs bus and does some substituting -- but only in LifeSkills classes.

We have attended local bowling events and track meets at Hamilton, Marble Falls, Burnet, West, Belton, Gatesville, Fort Hood and then on to state at San Marcos, Austin and Denton. We have not been to state in several years because our faithful male chaperon, Milton Nixon, passed away in 1998 after a long battle with diabetes. Milton would always stay put with the kids who were waiting for an event, and Susie and I would get them where they needed to be. Milton had the patience of Job helping us.

Some of the children we took on these trips had never been anywhere away from home. We always filled them up with burgers, pizza or Mexican food. There have been many hours of laughter, a few tears when an athlete did not win that medal they wanted but a ribbon instead, but those are some mighty precious memories.

Susie helped train athletes for many events. Girls’ shot put was her daughter DeNae’s specialty in the field events. Susie also helped with softball throw for boys and girls, 25m assisted walk, 25m unassisted walk, 50m fast walk, 100m dash, 50m dash, 200m dash, 400m fast walk. I helped her one year with a boys’ relay team when we had a scrimmage with Hamilton here on our turf. Everything was going great with our teams until the third set of boys handed off the baton; Lampasas handed off to Hamilton, and Hamilton handed off to Lampasas. We all laughed and just had a good time anyway. That was the end of our relay team.

In the early ’90s, several people from school and the community asked Susie and me to sponsor a local track meet. We had lots of volunteers: National Honor Society, food service ladies, many other people and some parents of our athletes. We had several schools and adult group homes to participate. We had a blast, but we did not get to spend much time with our athletes because a track meet is tons of work. Lots of preparation goes into getting it all planned and completed. Now we merely attend someone else’s local, such as Hamilton or Gatesville. We have gone at times to Waco at Baylor.

When I first started working with Susie, we had adults in our local program. We at one time had a mother and her son involved. We had to stop working with adults several years ago, but there are still many adults who participate in Special Olympics, including DeNae Dyer. She also has retired as of spring 2009 after 29 years of participating.

We have had several other helpers over the years and then a couple of coaches also. The certified coaches have moved away, but this semester two paraprofessionals from the high school LifeSkills class, Ann Byers and Cindy Hoozer, went to athletic training and completed their 10-hour practicum so they are fully certified in athletics. Thank you, ladies, and thank you, LISD, for allowing that to happen.

They all contributed in many ways to our Special Olympics program, but Susie Dyer has been our leader all these years. Our athletes are very fortunate that Lampasas ISD supports our program.

Janet Sanguinet