Tarrant County - Obituaries - Fred B. Dickey

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FRED B. DICKEY 1913-2007



By BARRY SHLACHTER
Star-Telegram Staff Writer
FORT WORTH -- Fred B. Dickey, a schoolteacher-turned-insurance entrepreneur
with a penchant for big-game hunting in Africa and collegial gin rummy games
at Shady Oaks Country Club, died Christmas Eve.
He was 94 and had been in ill health, his daughter Sandra Dickey Marks, said
Wednesday.

Mr. Dickey operated Service Life Insurance, which specialized in marketing
policies to military personnel, after buying it in 1949 for $75,000 two
years after its founding.

Policies in force rose from $2.2 million to $243 million by 1964, making it
the largest Fort Worth-based insurance company. In 1967, it merged with
World Heritage Life Insurance Co., becoming World Service Life Insurance,
which in turn became part of Stocken National Life Insurance Co., which Mr.
Dickey controlled until the late 1970s.

Born Dec. 12, 1913, to East Texas cotton farmers and reared in the community
of Blackjack, southeast of Tyler, Mr. Dickey became a teacher -- as well as
the bus driver at one school -- after attending what was then Stephen F.
Austin State Teachers College in Nacogdoches.

He began selling insurance on the side and realized, he told an interviewer
in 1964, that "I could earn more money selling insurance on a part-time
basis than I could teaching school full time. So I withdrew from teaching,
which was probably a good thing for the children."

Mr. Dickey, who drove a succession of Rolls-Royces and decorated his office
with mounted African game trophies, was active in Junior Achievement and was
appointed to head an advisory board overseeing the construction of the
downtown convention center. He later headed the Exchange Club.

He was preceded in death by his wife, Evelyn Mason Dickey, in 2002, and his
son, Fred Dickey Jr., who was killed in a 1965 road accident.

He is also survived by daughter Dee Dickey Chapon; two grandchildren; and
five great-grandchildren.

SERVICES

A memorial will be held at 3 p.m. Friday at Broadway Baptist Church,
followed by a private entombment at Greenwood Mausoleum.