Norman V. Horner is a retired educator who doesn’t really care whether folks call him “Dr.” or not. His distinguished career--plus his 40 articles in professional journals and his leadership in scholarly organizations--suggest that he’s been worthy of his degree for a long time.
A Brown County native, Horner holds A.A., B.S., M.S. and Ph.D. degrees, respectively, from Tarleton State (then Junior) College, two from what was then the University of North Texas and his doctorate from Oklahoma State University.
Most of us would need help to pronounce--much less understand--all the multi-syllabic words employed by this distinguished educator who rose from the role of instructor to Dean of the College of Science and Mathematics during his tenure at Midwestern State University in Wichita Falls (1971-2006). Mild-mannered and Christ-centered, he is at once humble, modest, agreeable and engaging, even chuckling when folks refer to him as “the spider man.”…
He has spent a couple of decades searching out spiders near Big Bend Ranch State Park, 100 or so south miles of Alpine, TX, and 550 from his longtime home in Wichita Falls.
Horner has made dozens of trips--often committing entire weekends--to “poking around” the area.
Specifically, his interest has been in Araneology, the study of spiders….
He agrees with Bob Hope’s contention that in West Texas, there are miles and miles of nothing but miles and miles.
In the Big Bend, however, are objects of sheer grandeur, including cascading peaks, unique plants, abundant wildlife, rugged terrain, and, of course, spiders.
Dr. Horner has been interested in spiders since his master’s study….
Permit me to share the title of his thesis: “Observation on the Life History of the Brown Recluse Spider, Loxosceles reclusa Gertsch and Muliak.” That was in 1967, and four years later, his dissertation title was “The Bionomics of the Spider Metaphidippus galathea (Walckenaer) and its Significance as a Biological Control Agent in Sorghum.”
All this to say the man’s “ahead of the pack” of many colleagues who’d just as soon let him look for the arachnids out west.
Many scientists might side with the Yankee who visited Sweetwater, TX, for the rattlesnake round-up. He bragged about his venture to everyone, and once was asked how many snakes he found. “None,” he answered. “When you’re looking for rattlesnakes, none is plenty.”…
Gregg Broussard, now a college biology prof, became deeply interested in spiders.
Mentored by Dr. Horner, he made a few trips to the same “digs” where the “spider man” had done most of his “poking.” (The Dalquest family donated two sections of land which made Midwestern University’s research center there possible.)
Broussard found a spider there he couldn’t identify, so he showed it to Horner. His mentor assured him that he likely could identify both the name and family of the spider, if given a few days….
Sadly, he couldn’t. The spider taxonomist of the American Arachnological Association worked feverishly, sharing the challenge with the top national “spider minds.” They couldn’t ID the spider, either.
It has been an ongoing process for 15+ years. Finally, the American Arachnological Society decided that Broussard had found a new species, as well as a new family. (There now are 120 spider families, and previously unknown species have been discovered only seven times in the past 88 years—in 1931, ’40, ’47, ’55, ’80 and 2012.)
Exonerated on these findings of a spider that has been around for many centuries is Dr. Horner, who was almost stumped by his student….
The retiree has won numerous faculty awards and is greatly respected by the Entomological Society of America, and other scientific organizations.
In 2016, he and Jane, his wife of 57 years, moved to Hamilton, TX, where they are active in church activities and “tending to their farm.”
He still makes periodic visits to the research center that came about because of his intense interest in research there….
Dr. Newbury is a long-time public speaker and university president who writes weekly. Email: newbury@speakerdoc.com. Phone: 817-447-3872. Facebook: Don Newbury. Twitter: @donnewbury.
