Murray State College President Emeritus Dr. Clyde and Joan Kindell

Clyde Kindell was reared on a general crop and dairy farm and attended rural Victor Grade School through 8th grade. He attended Checotah High School from the 9th grade through 12th grade, graduating in 1945. He served in the United States Army from 1945 through 1947, serving in the European Theater of Operations. Upon being discharged from the Army with the rank of Staff Sergeant, Clyde attended Oklahoma A&M (OSU), receiving a bachelors of science degree in agricultural education in 1950. On Aug. 9, 1948, Clyde married Joan Benson in Cleveland, Oklahoma, and both continued their education at Oklahoma A&M.

From 1950 through 1956, Clyde taught vocational agriculture, one year at Owasso and five years at Broken Arrow. From 1956 through 1958, Clyde attended OSU for post-graduate studies and served as a graduate assistant during that time. He attended Pennsylvania State University during the summer of 1957 for post-graduate studies and returned to Oklahoma A&M with completion of a Doctorate in higher education in September 1958.

Dr. Kindell joined the OSU staff to provide contractual services to the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) in establishing agricultural and technical schools and colleges in Ethiopia, East Africa. From 1958 through 1960, he served as Director of Instruction and Research at the Jimma Agriculture Technical School in Jimma, Ethiopia. From 1960 through 1966, he served as President of the Imperial Ethiopian College of Agriculture and Mechanical Arts at Alemaya, Ethiopia. Among other things, he presented papers on agriculture at meetings of the World Food and Agriculture Organization at Kampala, Uganda and Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. During his tenure, Kenya gained independence from Great Britain which resulted in the European farmers dispersing their Kenyan operations. As college president, Dr. Kindell arranged the import of two plane-loads of highly-bred dairy animals into Ethiopia from Kenya.

In 1966, Dr. Kindell took sabbatical leave and pursued post-doctoral studies at the University of Minnesota. Following one year of sabbatical leave, he was appointed President of Murray State College, Tishomingo, and remained there until 1994, serving 27 years in that position. During his tenure at Murray State College, he also served as a consultant for the Catholic Relief Service in Ecuador, chaired the Review Committee of the Oklahoma Health Systems Agency Board, served on the Southern Regional Board of the International Institute of Education, chaired the Southern Oklahoma Development Trust, chaired the McGee Creek Authority Board of Trustees during construction of the McGee Creek reservoir, and was co-founder of the Oklahoma-Ethiopian Assistance Group, Inc.

Over the years, he was honored to receive numerous local and state recognition awards and was inducted into the Oklahoma Higher Education Hall of Fame in 1998. Dr. Kindell was a kind and compassionate leader who never lost his passion for Murray State College and its students.