By M.J. Van Deventer
Staff Writer
For as long as he can remember, Larry Derryberry has loved to tell stories to his four grandchildren. Many of those tales are about his youth spent on a leased tenant farm in Jackson County near Altus.

“We had horses, cows, big chickens, a very mean bull, lizards and a snake that liked to sun itself on a hay bale,” he said. And he admitted that, as he tells his grandchildren these stories, he embellishes them greatly.

There were also fierce storms. “We had to watch for the tornadoes. It was well before the days of television stations that watched weather like hawks. We had a storm shelter, and my mother would usher us in to safety. My dad would be the last to arrive.”

Derryberry, a former Oklahoma legislator and attorney general, has used those farm animals and the tornadoes of his youth to create a children’s book, complete with a compact disc, so the children who read it can sing along.

“The Oklahoma Scranimal” (Tate Publishing, $14.99) is a story about farm animals and what happens to them “when a big tornado came out of the sky and picked up the big red barn.”

The five farm animals — the main characters in the book — are having a rather refined breakfast together when they are caught up in that storm. When the storm subsides, the five animals are “stirred together like a skillet full of scrambled eggs,” Derryberry writes.

Where five animals used to be, now there is one — the scranimal. This “hybrid” has features from a pig, a duck, a cow, a sheep and a horse. Scranimal loves oats and ears of corn and sometimes a bale of hay. Most of all, he loves to roll in the thick, green pasture grass.

What to do with Scranimal? Send him to the zoo? No. Papa Derryberry decides Scranimal will spend the rest of his life on this comfortable farm in southwestern Oklahoma, being pampered as the king of his one-of-a-kind species.

Derryberry loves music, and it is no surprise that the accompanying CD is a musical feast. A professional music group plays in the background. Six well-known Oklahoma personalities sing the dialogue of the animals. Gov. Brad Henry sings the saga of the sheep. Bob Funk, who owns a magnificent Clydesdale arena in northwest Oklahoma City, speaks the horse’s role. Former Miss America Jane Jayroe gracefully tells the duck’s story. You will recognize the famous voices on the CD.

Before asking Henry to be involved in the book, Derryberry said he called first lady Kim Henry.

“Can the governor sing?” Derryberry asked.

“Yes, he thinks he can,” she said.

“Kim was right. He’s quite a good singer,” Derryberry said.

World-class gymnast Nadia Comaneci sings the cow’s tale. Singing is not an unusual role for her. Last summer, she recorded famous youth stories for the children of her native Romania.

Four-star Gen. Tommy Franks contributes to the CD with an inspirational passage.

Former University of Oklahoma and Dallas Cowboys football coach Barry Switzer lobbied to play the voice of the pig. He is a native of Arkansas, a state known for its razorbacks. Who better to sing that role?

Derryberry sings, too, as the thread of music that is the unifying theme throughout the professionally produced CD.

Books are at the heart of attorney Derryberry’s world. He grew up listening to his mother read him Bible stories. And he loves books on history, adventure, and state and national political leaders. He often reads books on past U.S. presidents and Oklahoma political leaders, especially Robert S. Kerr and Carl Albert.

“People are surprised when I tell them I’ve written a children’s book,” Derryberry said with a laugh. “Most people thought I would write about history, law and politics, my three great loves. But I love being a storyteller for my grandchildren.”

His next book is under contract with Tate Publishing in Mustang, It will have an Indy 500 theme with his beloved five diverse farm animals in a fabled race. It will be, he said, offering a hint, like the Indy 500, a race to the finish. Only, his farm animals, not race car drivers, will be the stars.

UM tells how his book’s premises work for churches, too

By Joan G. LaBarr
Special Contributor

Many people move into a resolution mode each new year to take stock of where they are physically, mentally, spiritually and professionally. Bottom line, it’s time to get fit.

But whether we will maintain our resolve and become a new and improved version of ourselves by next December largely depends on how purposeful we are in pursuing our new goals.

The new book, Fit for Service: Recycle Inefficiency into Philanthropy (Tate Publishing & Enterprises, 2007), by Dr. David Childs, provides a step-by-step road to success.

Dr. Childs, a lifelong United Methodist who has been the Dallas County tax assessor/collector for the past 18 years, is highly regarded for the efficiencies and responsiveness of his office and his commitment to quality management practices.

The 12 steps toward organizational fitness are outlined in this book. It offers a unique and memorable approach to quality management with the goal of helping businesses and organizations become more efficient and effective.

The book’s subtitle offers a reason and motivation for these changes. When he began the book, Dr. Childs says he was totally focused on quality management principles, studying how government agencies in particular could be made more efficient, better managed and more responsive to the public.

Then he had a moment of epiphany: “I thought of taking quality management in a different direction, promoting it as a way to raise money for philanthropy,” he said. Though Dr. Childs wrote the book with a business/organization orientation, many of his basic premises are also helpful to individuals and churches who want to be more fit for personal and corporate missions.

Dr. Childs, a longtime member of Plymouth Park United Methodist Church in Irving, Texas, is clear about how his Christian faith shapes his approach to life and work. In the introduction, he acknowledges gratitude first to God, for “assigning to me such a wonderful, joyful and fulfilling life’s mission.”

Many of his insights come from studying human behavior and his realization that “an organization is not a sterile, inert bureaucratic mechanized assembly line, because it is far too impacted by human behavior. It is instead, a living, changing, teeming mass of human and mechanical cells that combine to form a living organism.”

In seeing an organization as an organism, he was able to develop an extended metaphor, drawing parallels between the human body and an organization. His 12 parallels, a 12-Step Fitness Plan for Organizations, are cast in the language of the well-known Twelve Step programs to overcome personal addictions.

In probing into an organization’s nature, Dr. Childs uses the term, “soul.” He calls organizations to develop a humane, ethical, purposeful environment where individuals are recognized and appreciated. The goal is to achieve a “purposeful family” environment, characterized by mission, purpose, civility, humanity and teamwork.

Dr. Childs sees many of the qualities he lifts up in the book as consistent with the Methodist traditions in which he was nurtured from childhood. One of his hopes is that United Methodists will become better able to articulate what the church does in ministry and be able to answer succinctly: “What does this church do? What is its purpose?”

He credits his family and church background for shaping his perspective on life in helping him to value philanthropy and charitable giving. That commitment led to his insight that cutting waste and improving efficiency in business could achieve more than a healthy bottom line: It could also produce money for charity and the common good.

He sees the spirit of the book as applicable to church life. “Jesus himself had a pretty low overhead,” he wryly observes.

“It is not making huge, dramatic changes, but paying attention to minor tweaking every day. If you consistently keep in mind how to do the small things, you can improve operations over time with a dramatic impact.”

Regarding churches, he explains further in an interview: “It is not one person trying to make dramatic changes, but 300 people each doing small things that makes the difference…. Just as Jesus responded to hate, anger and negative thoughts with love, organizations need to respond to negativism with a positive outlook and approach.”

Dr. Childs has received numerous recognitions and awards for the Tax Office he has led for 18 years—proof of his positive outlook and approach. He’s also an effective speaker at conferences and seminars, and teaches graduate business courses in systems thinking and transformational leadership.

His next book will shift emphasis from the micromanaging details to focus on the “big picture,” he says, a global view of organizational efficiency and health.

For more information, visit www.fitforservice.org.

Learn more about “Fit for Service“