Gaines B. "Barry" Huneycutt, Jr. Environmental Science Scholarship

"It was only fitting to establish this scholarship in Barry’s name,” his wife, Richy said. “Barry is enthusiastic about everything he does and it was no different when he first came to LCC to break new ground with the Water Resources Management program. Teaching gave him a chance to see firsthand how an education could change the lives of his students,” she said. “He has touched so many lives in and out of the classroom. My daughter, Kaitlin, and I wanted Barry to know that he has made a difference, not only in people’s lives, but in the industry as well. We had a chance to show him with this scholarship before his death.”
Huneycutt was diagnosed with cancer in 2003, and while it may have slowed him down a little it did not squash his passion for the program.

“One of the hardest things he said he ever had to do was retire from the college because of this disease,” his wife said. “Of all the things he had ever done in his career, seeing people with no direction come to LCC and leave with a new career, a new focus, and knowing that he had a part in that, was by far the best profession ever.”

Pete Onidi, one of the first classes to graduate under Huneycutt’s tutelage, would agree. “He (Huneycutt) is a great mentor and a great friend,” he said. “He made the classroom interesting and the work important. He has taught me a great deal.”

Onidi took over the leadership of the program when Huneycutt retired. “I still call Barry for advice and for direction,” he said. “He knows the system and he has made valuable contributions to the industry. In this business, most everyone knows Barry and what he has done to move the industry forward.”

Horticulture Program Head and friend Bill Scott said that he and Barry worked closely together at LCC to find ways their programs intermingled. “Barry is always thinking of a different way to make something better,” he said. “He loves challenges and because of that he makes everyone around him work that much harder to do their very best. He is missed on this campus.”

Once fully endowed, the scholarship will be awarded to a deserving student with preference to someone in the Environmental Science/Water Resources Management Program or the Horticulture Program.

For more information on the LCC Foundation Fifty for Fifty campaign, contact LCC Foundation Direction Jeanne Kennedy at 233-6812.

If anyone would have asked Barry Huneycutt if he ever thought he would have been a teacher, he would have laughed. Working in the water and wastewater field right out of college, Huneycutt said he kind of fell in his profession.

Huneycutt who died recently after a battle with cancer used to say that no one grows up wanting to be a wastewater operator, but he knew it was an essential job and it was a profession that had been good to him.

As such, Huneycutt headed the Water Resources Management program at Lenoir Community College when it first was established in 1999. After retiring on medical disability, he said that teaching was the best job he ever had and he missed the classroom as well as the students.

Because of his passion for education, his family and friends have established the Gaines B. “Barry” Huneycutt, Jr. Environmental Science Scholarship for endowment through the LCC Foundation as part of its “Fifty for Fifty” campaign. The special campaign hopes to secure 50 new scholarships for endowment for 50 students during the college’s 50th anniversary celebration which kicks off
July 1 and culminates on the college’s anniversary on
April 3, 2008.