Derrich joined the B & P Club (the Burp & Poot Club was the predecessor of The Fellowship of Christian Sportsmen - FCS) in 1989. We attended Ken Farmer’s Sunday School class along with Eddy Chance, Larry Dowden and others. We would start the fellowship time of each class off with discussions about hunting and fishing. About this time he also joined my Great Hills Baptist Church men’s softball team. Derrich played catcher and had a bad habit of crowding the plate. I just knew that he was going to get bopped by a bat one day. My low league team was too slow for him so he started a medium league team that he coached for 17 years, I believe. Derrich immediately became very involved with all three groups and we soon became close friends.

Derrich participated in many fall and winter dove retreats and hunts, sporting clays and skeet shoots, 24 hour sporting clays shoots, fishing trips (both fresh and salt water), a hog hunt, and a goose hunt. He led devotionals at Club meetings for many years.

He served as Executive Vice President, Vice President, and, most recently, Vice President of Ministries, for a total of seven years. He was one of my chief counselors. I counted on him to speak his mind, something that he was always willing to do. He was not a “yes man” and told me if he thought that I was off base.

Derrich was also very involved with the Austin Christian Bass Club.

Derrich is included in many of our Club’s best hunting, fishing, and shooting memories. We were on a deer lease together – just the two of us. We pulled Eddy out of Lake Travis while white bass fishing on a cold February night, and then laughed about it for an hour. We had many close sporting clays matches – where the victor often won by one bird. We chased Axis deer on the Y.O. Ranch with Charlie Batts. We stood on piers for hours and blasted away at incoming clay targets at a 4/05 24 hour sporting clays shoot.

Derrich was competitive and was an outstanding fisherman. He routinely creamed me when we fished together. On one trip to Lake Austin with Derrich and Jim Quimby, I caught two bass and Derrich caught one. We continued to fish long after dark and long after the fish stopped biting. It was fairly obvious that we weren’t staying out just for fun. Derrich just couldn’t bear losing to me.

Derrich had a unique method of obtaining firewood during winter dove retreats. He would drive up to a dead tree on the ranch in his beloved Chevy Blazer, wrap a chain around it, pull it down, and then haul it back to camp. On one occasion he miscalculated and pulled the tree on top of his Blazer, resulting in a nice dent. He knew a body guy and was happy because he ended up making money from the incident.

Derrich also discovered a unique method of starting a camp fire during a winter dove retreat. He used a can of Coleman fuel, but I think that he didn’t realize how volatile it was. He lit the fire, but it wasn’t big enough for him, so he started to pour more fuel on it. Suddenly, the fire began to travel up the fuel stream. Derrich dropped the can and fuel splashed all over him, followed by the fire. Fortunately, Keith Miller, who was the only one with Derrich at the time, quickly got Derrich to lie on the ground and then jumped on top of him to smother the fire. Pastor Mark Weaver came out of his tent and said, "Boys, what are you doing?"

At later fall dove retreats, Derrich would drive into camp in a Class 5 Motor home, which he shared with several members. He’d bring about a hundred pounds of bacon and eggs and insist that we cook it all for breakfast. It’d be almost noon and Derrich and Steve Watkins would still be cooking bacon and eggs, even though all of us were stuffed.

Derrich delighted in talking about “Dad” (as he lovingly called the Lord). He loved sharing things that he had learned about Dad with others. He was part of a Tuesday morning Bible study for many years.

Derrich was one of those rare souls to whom the world was black and white. There were no shades of gray. Others had opinions – Derrich had rock solid beliefs. He was so conservative that he made Rush Limbaugh look like a liberal. It was always entertaining to listen to him and Bill Smith talk politics around a campfire at winter dove retreats.

Derrich and I played racquetball together for awhile. We both suffered from too much love for food and thought that we could lose weight by playing together. Of course we ruined that idea by eating Mexican food after we played.

I learned many cute terms from Derrich – like “Stinkamuffin” (a term he called his daughters), “Toes up meditation” (naps), and "fat boys."

Derrich's rules of eating are legendary. They include:

1. Hunger has absolutely nothing to do with eating

2. Being full is no reason to stop eating

3. Eating is a contest, whoever eats the most wins

4. There are few things in the world that can't be improved by deep frying

5. There are few things in the world that can't be improved by white gravy

Derrich had many qualities that I strive for – assertiveness, confidence, willingness to take a risk, drive, generosity, and a truly abundant life, as Jesus described it, free from worries.

Derrich was not just my best friend; but many people's best friend. I will miss him more than I have missed anyone before.

The Bible tells us that there will be a wedding feast of the Lamb, so I am convinced that there will be hunting and fishing in heaven to provide all that food. I look forward to hunting and fishing with him again when we are both in Glory.

Randy Rowley

High Flight by John Gillespie Magee, Jr.

Oh, I have slipped the surly bonds of earth
And danced the skies on laughter-silvered wings;
Sunward I've climbed, and joined the tumbling mirth
Of sun-split clouds — and done a hundred things
You have not dreamed of — wheeled and soared and swung
High in the sunlit silence. Hov'ring there,
I've chased the shouting wind along, and flung
My eager craft through footless halls of air.
Up, up the long, delirious burning blue
I've topped the windswept heights with easy grace
Where never lark, or even eagle flew.
And, while with silent, lifting mind I've trod
The high untrespassed sanctity of space,
Put out my hand, and touched the face of God.

Contributed by Mark Dillow

I too have many fond memories about Derrich and remember when he got a flat on government land during a quail hunt in that old blazer of his. It was a rail road tie spike. Go figure, he just laughed about it. He got my gun case by mistake once and called me to let me know and I asked him which case was the nicest. He said mine was, so I told him to keep it.

He was one of the best shots with a shotgun that I ever saw and his long overhead shots were legendary.

Ken Hamilton

One night after a game I asked him for some time and naturally he gave it. I spoke to him about a friend of mine that wanted to do personal investing for a living - his wife was dead set against it but the guy had been trying for years on his own. He just never got in with a group of guy's that would take time to teach him the ropes. There is more to the story but the net is Derrich opened up his office to this guy - trained him - witnessed to him - then gave him office space free which he still uses and continued to mentor the guy for absolutely nothing. What did Derrich get out of it? Well my thought is just another crown that he would lay at His feet.

Dick Geoffroy

The dove hunts will not be the same without him. I'm only jealous the he is with Jesus right now and I'm not. We will miss Derrick greatly.

Jim McGee

I was talking to Mark Weaver today and we have one memory we would like to add. On one of our first Dove hunts on Jimmy Wade's property Derrich would collect fire wood by using his Blazer to pull down huge trees and then drag them back to camp.

We all would laugh as we heard the roaring of his engine in the distance and then the crack of the tree as it hit the ground.

Paul Wilson

I was talking to Paul and was remembering things like when Derrich set himself on fire trying to get the lantern to work or the night he pulled down the tree on top of his truck so we would have a great fire. God is great even now.

Mark Weaver

I remember Derrich as you do. Although I don’t remember the most important time he was there for me. I got in the crash and was ejected out of my truck. He was the only person I knew. The paramedics called him and he came to my side. I will never forget that. What a loving friend. I still think of him every time I see a black Blazer and remember all the softball and dove hunting I was graced to do with him. Just goes to show you that there are no promises for tomorrow or even the next minute.

Shane Morgan.

The City’s a whole lot dimmer today without his light.

Jim Rumbo

How about a few Derrich stories. If I keep talking I may stop crying. 1999 Texas Association of Bass Clubs (TABC) Top Six. Al Lykins and I proceeded to a spot on Richland Chambers that the previous weekend had produced some larger fish for an Austin Christian Bass Club (ACBC) travel tourney. Within an hour we caught over 24 lbs of fish, four fish from that area, two over 6 lbs and two over 5 lbs. Derrick was to meet us there at 11:30 AM. We left to weight in early. Derrick and Tom Kelm proceeded to catch the second heavy bag and second big bass. Their bag was close to 22 lbs, with one fish over 8 lbs. Nine fish came off that one spot, all over 5 lbs. We didn't even need to catch a fish on Sunday to win. I am still proud to have been a part of that Texas State Championship Team. I can remember thinking there wasn't a better group of guys that I could have been associated with than them. Derrick epitomized the character of what our club stands for.

Next story... Gibbons Creek mid 90's. I'm fishing the spillway wing walls but a north wind is making it hard to cast. There was a buoy line that limited how close to the dam we could get. Our baits were landing a little short of the target. Derrich figured that if I put my trolling motor on high and he did the same thing with his boat we could push in the buoy line enabling us to get a good cast before we would slingshot back. We had to time it just right but it worked. After a few trips forward and back Derrick hooked a monster fish, the biggest fish I have ever seen in person. It was over 28 inches long and if it hadn't been the middle of summer... I could only guess how much it could have weighed. It is still to my knowledge the biggest bass ever caught in the history of ACBC - over 12.5 lbs paper weight. That’s in over 27 years of fishing.

Next story.... Last years TABC Top Six was held at Sam Rayburn in October. On the first day of competition I get a call from one of our teammates (to remain nameless) saying they had run aground and were stuck big time. Derrick was at least a few miles closer so I called him and asked if he would help pull them off. He of course said yes and as soon as it got daylight he proceeded to find and free our stuck buds. Something that Derrick was known for - helping others. On the last day of competition I was headed to the weigh in with four fish. I was the first flight. I came out of Veach headed to the dam and something was terribly wrong. I had slung a blade off of my prop. There I sat in the middle of the lake with only 30 minutes to get them to the scales and I didn't have another prop or enough time. Derrich buddy I need your help. That’s not quite what I said to him on the phone but what he said was, "I'LL BE RIGHT THERE!" And he was. The fish were in the bag, he pulled up and the hand off was made, and with hardly any words spoken the feeling of hopelessness was replaced with joy. You see we were in 4th place as of Saturday. I knew, and so did Derrich, that we had to have those fish to have any chance at winning. Derrich made it by the cut of time (with four minutes left). We placed 2nd in the State Championship missing 1st by less that 1.5 lbs. A side note here...Derrich had four fish also. He sacrificed 30 minutes of fishing time to help his team out. He left biting fish to come help me. He never once complained or even pointed that out (like I probably would have just to rib someone) but that was Derrich, that is Derrich.

I'm going to miss his big smile and bigger heart, his "can do" attitude and take charge nature, his bald head and big belly that I used to rub for good luck.

I'll always remember and love you Bro.

I hope you guys have a Derrich in your lives or better yet you are him for someone.

Craig Mooney

In Memory of Derrich Pollock