Land. Oil. Cattle. This trinity of Texas icons has played a major role in the life of Dr. C.R. “Dick” Sherron ’62.
Sherron raises cattle in Jefferson and Duval counties and is corporate medical director for Trinity Industries, a $2.5 billion diversified industrial company headquartered in Dallas.
He is president of the Texas and Southwestern Cattle Raisers Association, a position filled in the past by such Lone Star notables as Gov. Dolph Briscoe Jr.; the King Ranch’s Robert Kleberg Sr., creator of the Santa Gertrudis cattle breed; and King Ranch heir Richard Kleberg Sr., U.S. representative from 1931 to 1944.
Through the years, Sherron has proved he has the mettle to succeed in medicine, the military and management.
He was born in Livingston, but his family moved many times during his youth as his father’s work for Gulf Oil took him to new areas of oilfield development in Texas and Louisiana. During those years, the family’s interest in cattle was never far away, and, as a boy, he was active in caring for them.
Sherron attended Beaumont High School and worked the family’s cattle in Raywood and Batson. At 15, Sherron took money earned as a roughneck to purchase 21 head of crossbred cattle of his own. He managed the herd throughout his high school and college years.
He attended Lamar his freshman year, then transferred to the University of Texas at Austin. When Hurricane Carla made landfall between Port O’Connor and Port Lavaca on Sept. 11, 1961, its impact on the oil industry meant a lot of recovery work for Sherron’s father. “I knew I would be needed to take care of the cattle, so I came home to Beaumont,” Sherron said.
While home, he assessed the benefits of continuing his schooling at Lamar. “Lamar had a great pre-med program under Dean Edwin Hayes,” he said. “At the time, Lamar had the second-highest acceptance rate into medical school of any state-supported school.” Sherron found he could complete his pre-med program in three years, stay in the cattle business, and live at home where “mom was an awfully good cook.”
After he graduated Lamar, Sherron sold his herd to pay for the ring he slipped on the finger of sweetheart Ella Mays, who attended Lamar from 1960 to 1961. That sale also helped finance his start at UT Medical Branch in Galveston. When he completed his studies and residency, Sherron was a board-certified family practitioner.
Later, Sherron served three years in the Army, including a tour of duty in Vietnam, where he received the Army Commendation Medal and Bronze Star. As a battalion surgeon for 3rd Corps during the Tet Offensive, he treated the U.S. commander in Vietnam, Gen. Creighton Abrams Jr., for a minor burn. “I was just a captain, but he was very gracious,” Sherron said.
After completing his military service, Sherron joined a practice in the Lake Jackson-Freeport area. Three years later, he returned to Beaumont and established his own practice. Sherron bought land and began ranching again, and his Brahmaninfluenced cattle proved a must for heat, humidity, insect and parasite resistance in Southeast Texas. Through the decades, the family property has been expanded several times, and another ranch was acquired in Duval County.
Sherron became the chief of staff at St. Elizabeth and Beaumont Medical Surgical hospitals. “That was a pretty big honor for a family practitioner,” Sherron said. There, he chaired scores of committees and oversaw many projects, including the creation of the walk-in StatCare clinic. He established Beaumont Family Practice Associates, oversaw a contract with the county for inmate care and created a mobile wellness program that provided exams in plants from Corpus Christi to New Orleans.
In 1995, the hospital sought to expand services and bought his businesses. Sherron continued as a primary care medical director for five years, helping develop clinics in Jasper, Kirbyville, Winnie, Fannett and Lumberton, and helped forge stronger coordinated care relationships between the clinics and regional hospitals.
Today, Sherron brings his medical acumen to bear on challenges facing the 20,000-employee-strong Trinity Industries. Active in the Texas and Southwestern Cattle Raisers Association for more than three decades, and elected a director in 1993, Sherron became president in March 2005.
His contributions to health care extend far beyond the region. A former chairman of the Texas Animal Health Commission, Sherron was a member of the original working group that helped USDA and the beef industry develop firewalls to protect both people and cattle from exposure to bovine spongiform encephalopathy, or mad cow disease.
Sherron’s medical background has made him a valued member of the Secretary of Agriculture’s Advisory Committee for Foreign Animal and Poultry Diseases and the Tuberculosis Committee of the U.S. Animal Health Association. He is also a former member of the Texas Beef Council and National Cattlemen’s Beef Association and has chaired NCBA’s Human Nutrition Research Committee.
Perpetually a proponent of quality, Sherron blends his knowledge of medical science with industry savvy wrought by years of hard work. He is quick to point out the importance of a high-protein diet to America’s aging population who face the reality of sarcopenia, or loss of muscle mass, as they age. Sherron’s concern is that today’s low-protein, high-carbohydrate diets may exacerbate this natural process, leaving tomorrow’s elderly with less muscle for strength and balance, which leads to increased potential for disability.
What about the concerns of fat? “The industry has developed 29 cuts of beef that have only 1 gram more fat than skinless, tasteless chicken breast, with a lot more protein value,” Sherron said. “I understand the concerns about bad fats, but what we need is balance. If you eat a modified high-protein diet, you can maintain muscle mass, strength and agility much longer than Americans are doing today.”
Today, Sherron helps guide the association as it addresses a myriad of issues affecting Texas’ cattle industry and the state’s farmers and ranchers. Those issues include urban sprawl, private property rights, water rights, transportation challenges, liability, economics, estate taxes, international trade, bioterrorism, animal heath and more. While those issues can seem as big as the Texas sky, and political winds can change as suddenly as the weather, Sherron takes a long-term view. “For many of these ranchers, the land is almost a sacrament,” he said. “They want to pass that heritage on to the next generation.” For Sherron and Ella, future generations mean their four children – Scott Sherron, a cardiologist in Beaumont; Colleen Jackson; Gretchen Bjerke; and Paige Andrews – and 13 grandchildren.
At the time of the interview, Sherron was preparing for a three-week, association sponsored trip to New Zealand to learn first hand about the nation’s beef industry.
“If you rest, you’ll rust,” Sherron said. “And I don’t want to get rusty.”
“I love Lamar, and I love UT,” Sherron said.
That is why his herd always sports at least one longhorn “so those Aggies can see them when they drive by,” he said. “I have been extremely blessed in life to have had a quality education, a wonderful family, the honor of serving the most wonderful country in the world and two honorable professions: healing the sick and feeding the hungry.”
