Mr. Ray Bean

Ray Bean History

Raymond Berry (Ray) Bean was born in Morrilton, Ark., but moved with his family to Little Rock at the age of 1, and grew up there during the Great Depresson, working to help support his family from the age of 12.

He graduated from Little Rock High School (now Central High School) in 1935 and worked in his father’s music store, Bean Music Company, for about a year. He took his total savings of $25 and bought a train ticket for $14 to Chicago, to see if he could get into George Williams College, but he didn’t have enough money. He returned to Little Rock and attended Little Rock Junior College (now the University of Arkansas at Little Rock) for three years.

The Little Rock YMCA had called to see if Ray would teach courses in amateur radio, which was actually a hobby of his older brother, George. They had the wrong Bean brother, but Ray ended up teaching swimming for the Y. He went to junior college on a scholarship of the National Youth Association (NYA), which also paid him 25 cents an hour for mowing grass.

He became the Assistant Boys’ Work Secretary for the Little Rock YMCA and organized group activities such as hikes, swimming, gym and Friday night movies. In the summer, his boss served as summer camp director and Ray took over his position as Secretary. For three years Ray served as a part-time youth worker and camp recruiter, and for two years as youth director and camp director.

In 1939, at the age of 22, Ray became the director for Camp Ross Lander on Lake Catherine in Malvern, Arkansas. He directed the camp for two years and was at camp when he received his draft notice from the U.S. Army in August of 1941.

On reporting for duty, he was sent to Fort Riley, Kansas, for basic training in the horse cavalry. Since he had had four years of college, though no degree, he was offered the option of officers’ training but turned it down because he wanted three years of additional service.

After only a short while as platoon leader, he was summoned to headquarters, where they needed an athletic director and because of his YMCA background, was selected to serve as an athletic director in Special Services. He volunteered for paratrooper training and was sent to Fort Benning, Ga., for parachute training with the 101st Airborne Division. After several weeks of training, on his second parachute jump, he dislocated his shoulder and was “permanently disqualified” from parachuting. He remained stateside all five years of his service in the war.

Ray was honorably discharged from the Army in December of 1945 as a First Lieutenant, and on separation from the military was promoted to Captain. In early 1946, after his discharge from the Army, he went back to George Williams College on the GI Bill to finish his college degree. He graduated in June, 1946, with a B.S. in Group Work Education. He took a job as a youth worker and camp director with the San Antonio YMCA and Camp Flaming Arrow and spent six years there, from 1946 to 1952.

He moved to Dallas in the fall of 1952 when he was hired as executive director of YMCA Camp Grady Spruce directly by H. Grady Spruce, the first director and namesake of the new camp on Possum Kingdom Lake, 120 miles west of Dallas.

He had met Viola Boerstler at a camp conference in 1951in Fort Worth, in a session over sewer systems. She was a Girl Scout director for Camp Whispering Cedars and lived in Dallas.

Ray and Vi married on February 28, 1953, and their first summer of marriage they each directed separate summer camps. Then Ray said either she should resign, or he would. She resigned her position and until her death in 1973 they lived every summer at Camp Grady Spruce. In 1955, after 10 more years of reserve duty, primarily in San Antonio, he retired from inactive duty as Major. Ray and Vi’s only child, Susan, was born August 13, 1955.

Over 30 years as executive director of Camp Grady Spruce, Ray Bean guided its development to a three-location site, adding the Frontier Unit in 1962 on a separate piece of property down the lake and the dedicated all-girls’ Ray Bean Camp in 1973 on the same property as Main Camp. The Vi Bean Chapel at Ray Bean Camp was built and named in memory of his wife, who passed away November 8, 1973.

Ray oversaw millions of dollars in donations to Grady Spruce over the years, and positively influenced the lives of thousands of young men and women who became leaders in the Dallas business community and beyond. He counseled hundreds of former campers and staff on matters from business to personal, served as character reference and advocate for college and job applications, advocated for board members’ children in trouble with the law, pushed stringent risk management best practices for the American Camping Association, and served as unofficial counsel for the construction of Camp John Marc, a camp for chronically ill youth near Meridian, Texas, when it was constructed in 1990. He was a member of Highland Park Presbyterian Church and later Park Cities Presbyterian Church.

Ray retired from the YMCA in June of 1982 at the age of 65, having spent 43 years with the Y, 39 as a camp director. He was awarded the Special Recognition Award by the ACA in 1998 for his dedication to the camping profession, and was recognized as a Camp Legend at the Inaugural Camp Legends Dinner in 2013. He is considered by many to be one of the founders of modern risk management practices in professional camping.

Ray Bean died July 4, 2000 in Dallas at the age of 83 and is buried at Sparkman Hillcrest Cemetery in Dallas alongside his wife Vi. Honorary pallbearers were Dick Whittington, Don Bowles, Vance Gilmore, John Snowden, Tom Briggs and Gerry Storey.

His survivors included daughter Susan Bean Aycock and two grandsons, David Sellers Aycock and Bryan Wiliam Aycock.