Mr. Wilburn

My twin brother and I started 4th grade in Schweinfurt, Germany, where our soldier-stepfather was stationed. With only a couple of months left in the school year, we returned to the States and joined a close-knit group of Louisville 4th graders for whom we were a lot to process. Most of them had been together since kindergarten and had never stepped outside the state of Kentucky.

A few months into the next school year, our family moved to El Paso, the home of Fort Bliss. And, once again, we had to walk into a movie that had already started. It was an easier transition at Logan Elementary, where the comings and goings of Army brats drew no special attention. In an unprecedented move, they even assigned us the same teacher.

In our previous schools, we were separated; the thinking was that we would be too dependent on each other in the same classroom. Apparently, that psychological pedagogy hadn’t occurred to anyone at Logan. That was one stroke of luck. The other? For 5th grade, we got Mr. Wilburn.

Mr. Wilburn was a thin man who wore V-neck cardigans, and on one parent-conference night, he praised my mother for the sharp creases she put in my brother’s blue jeans. During sleepy post-lunch periods, he would put us to work copying great works of art from a book: I’ve never forgotten my effort with Bruegel’s Hunters in the Snow, which proved to me I need never take any elective art courses.

As we worked, Mr. Wilburn read and nibbled on a pile of Corn Nuts meticulously corralled on a clean sheet of notebook paper on his desk. Those up front undoubtedly heard more of the crunching — and smelled the intoxicating combination of fried corn and salt — that accompanied our artistic endeavors. What sticks with me is that our teacher hoisted one nut at a time, held just so betwixt index finger and thumb. What discipline the man had!

I wish I remembered more about Mr. Wilburn. I know that he spent a great deal of time teaching us to diagram sentences. As someone who has written for newspapers and taught high-school English, I wholeheartedly honor Mr. Wilburn for that preparation. And, I honor him for making me feel safe and successful for the few months we were together.

Mr. Wilburn is gone now. I didn’t know until my twin recently did a Google search, prompted by idle curiosity, and learned that Mr. Wilburn died in the spring of 1974, only nine years after we left his classroom. At age 63, he was still teaching elementary school in El Paso, but apparently had plans to retire that spring.

From his obituary, I learned things I didn’t know about my 5th grade teacher. He was a native of Kentucky, for example, something he may (or may not) have told us when we arrived in his class from Louisville. He served in the Army during World War II; he was a husband, a father of two, a grandfather of five. His principal described him as a “quiet, friendly man.”

His life was a good one, but his death was not.

On Saturday night, April 27, 1974, in a downtown El Paso bar, Mr. Wilburn encountered two carnival workers who had met in a Juarez jail. The three men left in Mr. Wilburn’s car and, while stopped along the Trans-Mountain Road, the carnies threw Mr. Wilburn off a steep roadside cliff, took his credit cards, and drove off in his car.

Mr. Wilburn’s body was discovered May 1. Decomposition made it impossible to determine whether he died from a blow to the head or an injury incurred in the fall, the local newspaper reported. His empty wallet was found at the scene.

His family was stunned; his son told a reporter, “He wouldn’t have hurt a fly…You wonder why he was picked…maybe that was the reason…he wouldn’t have hurt anyone.”

Because the carnies used the stolen credit cards, authorities readily located them in California. The pair was arrested and charged with murder; they ultimately pleaded guilty to voluntary manslaughter.

The trial took place in September. The prosecution argued the men drove to Trans-Mountain Road in a conspiracy to commit robbery. The defense contended that Mr. Wilburn lured the men to a secluded place for “homosexual contact,” that the bar where they met was known for such activity.

In the end, the men were convicted. One received a 30-year prison sentence; the other got five years, because he suffered from terminal emphysema and wasn’t expected to live more than three years.

I was in college journalism classes when all this occurred. I was unaware that, for several months in 1974, my 5th-grade teacher was making near-daily headlines in El Paso newspapers. Fifty years later, my brother’s idle curiosity sent me to newspapers.com, where I learned maybe more than I wanted to know. Sadly, I didn’t find a single story about my old teacher that wasn’t about his murder.

As Army brats, my twin and I had so many schoolteachers that we no longer remember them all by name. But, the gently eccentric Mr. Wilburn stuck with us, as he did with our mother, who loved to remind us about that time he complimented her creases.

I’ve always imagined him as he was in 1965. I’m glad I didn’t know how he died until now.

RIP, Mr. Wilburn. And thank you.