Dr. Charles O. Onstead

Dr. Charles O. Onstead (Colonel, U. S. Army, retired), died in his home on the 18th of May 2012, after a brief illness. He was born on the 14th of June 1922 in Garrett, Texas, to C. O. “Skip” and Mabel Merritt Onstead, both of whom preceded him in death.

Uncle Charley was trying hard to make it to his 90th birthday, but that was not to be.

Our uncle graduated from Ennis High School in 1939, where he was a member of the National Honor Society and President of his senior class. He enrolled at North Texas State Teachers College (now known as the University of North Texas) where he met his wife, the late Jo Ann Park Onstead. Uncle Charley joined the Army Air Corps reserves after Pearl Harbor was bombed. In February of his senior year, he was drafted and entered active service without graduating. He was trained in Aviation Mechanics, and in February of 1944, he boarded a converted cargo ship and the convoy steamed to Italy. The trip took the entire month of February, and the troops slept in bunks stacked five levels high, bathe in saltwater and ate their rations at tables standing up. At this time, Uncle Charley was a Private First Class with the 12th Air Corps Service Group, spending the majority of WWII in Naples, changing engines on the C-47’s. He was still in Naples when Germany formally surrendered to the Allied Forces on the 8th of May 1945. He was honorably discharged on the 1st of November 1945.

Uncle Charley married Jo Ann a month after being discharged and entered law school at SMU. After one semester he decided he’d rather pursue medicine, so he returned to North Texas State to complete his undergraduate studies. He graduated in 1947 and the same year entered Southwestern Medical School in Dallas. In the summer between his junior and senior years of medical school, he took active duty in the U.S. Army, was promoted to Staff Sergeant and sent to work at Brook Army Hospital in San Antonio. He graduated from medical school in 1951 and began a two year internship at Brooke. As a medical officer beginning his residency in 1953, Uncle Charley was sent to various places to study. He had a six month course in Industrial Health Physics at the Hanford Atomic Production Plant in Washington; and a stint at Camp Mercury in Las Vegas, Nevada where he watched atomic testing. He finished his residency in 1956. He was sent to Sandia Base in New Mexico for an eight week course in Nuclear Emergency Team Operations, taking field trips to Los Alamos where nuclear bombs were stored. After a six month course in radiological biology at Walter Reed Hospital, he went to Fort Knox, Kentucky where he worked with a medical and x-ray research unit until the end of 1958. Uncle Charley was promoted to Captain in 1959 and selected to build and run the U.S. Army Medical Research Unit in Landstuhl, Germany, near the Ramstein Air Force Base. He worked with scientists from Los Alamos and Germany to construct and operate the first “Whole Body Counter”. This unit was used to measure the levels of radiation in German civilians. In August of 1962, after three years in Germany, Charley left as a Major and returned to Brook Army Hospital as a staff Radiologist with the U.S. Army Medical Research Unit where he was promoted to Lieutenant Colonel. In May of 1966, he was sent to Vietnam and became the Commanding Officer of the 61st Medical Battalion at Cam Ranh Bay Port. After returning from R & R in Hong Kong, he was informed he would become the Commanding Officer of the 8th Field Hospital near the Nha Trang Airport. Charley served there for seven months before returning to Brook where he became Chief of Radiology. He retired from the Army as a full Colonel in 1970 at the age of 48. During his military career, Dr. Onstead received the National Defense Medal with 1st Oak Leaf Cluster, Vietnam Service Medal, Vietnam Campaign Medal and the Bronze Star.

After retiring from the military, Uncle Charley and Jody moved to Aiken, South Carolina, where he practiced as a radiologist until his retirement at the age of 70. He enjoyed playing golf, getting together with the Aiken Coffee Club, keeping up with politics and world events and financial markets. After the death of Jo Ann, he moved to Houston to be close to his family. While here, he became a devoted Astros fan; scheduling his calendar around Astros home games. While he had a long and distinguished career, and was honored and promoted for his accomplishments, those things pale in comparison to the man we knew and loved. Uncle Charley was genuinely interested in people and never forgot a name. He loved the history of his family and enjoyed showing us old pictures and telling stories of relatives of long ago. He felt it important that our family history would live on in those stories and would “drill” us on names and faces of aunts, uncles, great-great grandparents that we never met. Uncle Charley was the person you would want around in a crisis. When our sister Fran was diagnosed with bone cancer at the age of 16, he was the person she wanted around. His quiet presence had such a calming effect on her. He was a real gentleman and treated everyone with respect. Through his later years he’s had to have help keeping his home and business affairs in order. He’s never considered those who worked for him as just employees. He could tell you the names of every member of their family, kept pictures of their children on his refrigerator, helped some financially, and made sure that we (his nieces and nephews) would put them on our Christmas card list. They were his friends.

If we could choose only one thing to tell you about Uncle Charley, we would tell you about the loving devotion he had for his wife, Jody. Aunt Jody suffered a debilitating stroke in 2000 and spent her remaining years in a nursing home in Aiken. Except for the two days he spent recovering from a hernia operation, every day, for three years, Uncle Charley went to the nursing home and stayed by Jody’s bedside. He would go in the morning and stay until lunchtime. After lunch, he would go home and take a nap and after his nap, he would go back to the nursing home. Jody was unable to talk, but Uncle Charley would take her around in her wheelchair or maybe out for a drive. They would watch the stock market or golf tournaments on TV and he would keep her informed about what was going on in the world of politics. When it was bedtime, he’d play “Goodnight Sweetheart” on a CD player, kiss her goodnight and make the drive home alone. The same scenario was repeated the next day and the next, for three years.

This is the man our Uncle Charley will always be to us. Never arrogant with his brilliance or his accomplishments, but kind, sweet, loving, devoted, a true friend, interested in people. We are going to miss this precious man.

Dr. Charles, as he was affectionately called, was also pre-deceased by his brother, Robert R. Onstead of Houston, his brother-in-law, Stanley Wilson of Abilene, niece, Fran Onstead Washburn and great-nephew, Michael Robert Bonine. He is survived by his sister-in-law’s Mrs. Kay Martin Onstead of Houston and Mrs. Claudie Park Wilson of Abilene: nieces Patricia Park Hayes, Ann Onstead Hill, Mary Onstead, Marianne Wilson and Suzanne Park Wooten; nephews R. Randall Onstead, Charles Martin Onstead, Robert D. Park, Stanley P. Wilson, and Russell P. Wilson. He is also survived by several great-nieces and nephews, a cousin Bill Prestidge of Ennis, Tx and special friends Loren Vandiver, Johnnie Lallinger, Nicole Stewart, Shirley Shockley, David and Sue Hayes, Mossie Overstreet, Wayne Fugate and the men in the Aiken Coffee Club. Thank you to those who treated him with kindness and dignity as his body was giving out - - La Tonya, Linda, Jessie, Anthony, Wendy and Patricia. Our family felt comfortable knowing he was in your capable hands.

On Sunday afternoon, the 20th of May, friends gathered with the family during a visitation in the Library and Grand Foyer of Geo. H. Lewis & Sons in Houston.

The graveside service and interment is to be conducted at ten o'clock in the morning on Tuesday, the 22nd of May, at the Myrtle Cemetery, 100 Myrtle Street in Ennis, Texas, where military honors are to be rendered by the U.S. Army.

In lieu of customary remembrances, contributions in memory of Dr. Onstead may be directed to the University of North Texas, Onstead Institute for Education in the Visual Arts and Design Fund. UNT Foundation, Inc., 1155 Union Circle, #311250, Denton, TX, 76203-5017; or to the charity of one's choice.