Obituary for Lester G. Duck (1912-1970)
Tulsa World, 10 February 1970, Tulsa, Oklahoma.

Noted Conservationist of State Dies in Dallas

Lester G. Duck, 57, the first biologist employed by the Tulsa District Corps of Engineers, died Saturday of a heart attack in Dallas.

He joined the corps in 1946 following a stint with the Oklahoma Department of Wildlife Conservation. Duck, a native of Mooreland, received a B.S. at Northwestern at Alva, and completed Masters study at Oklahoma State in 1939.

While with the corps, Duck wrote numerous technical papers on environment and conservation. He authored a 144-page hard cover book "A Survey of Game and Furbearing Animals in Oklahoma" in 1943, accompanied by a game type map still in use that illustrates cover and vegetative growth used by animals in various parts of the state.

Duck was instrumental in formation of the Oklahoma Fish and Game Council, a group that sponsors five persons for post graduate study annually in fisheries research and the environment. The council is comprised of a member and alternate from Oklahoma State and Oklahoma, the wildlife department, the corps and the wildlife service.

Duck collaborated with the development of planning for the Arkansas, White and Red River basin study in the early 1950s. In 1958, he moved to Philadelphia to work on the Delaware River project, and in 1960 was transferred to the Ohio River study in Cincinnati. He returned to Dallas about a year ago.

Duck is survived by his wife, Marie, of the home, two daughters and a son. Funeral arrangements are being conducted by the Knittel Funeral Home of Mooreland. Services will be at the Methodist Church at Mooreland with burial to follow at 2 p.m.

[My grandfather — P.Teter]




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