Late land developer known as `stand-up guy'
Valuable asset," "a stand-up guy," "a classic gentleman," "moral and ethical values above approach" — friends and colleagues so described Mustang land developer Robert Crout, who died in a car crash earlier this month in the Texas Panhandle.
What I remember most was the timing of his presidency of Central Oklahoma Home Builders Association.
It was 2013. He was in his
early to mid-60s, significantly older than most of the trade group's leadership.
Homebuilding was on the rebound from the depths of the Great Recession four years before. The rebound brought its own challenges to a weakened industry.
That summer, after several especially damaging tornadoes, local, established builders had to cope with a wave of unproven or questionable out-of-state construction and repair companies, while buyers wanting to buy or rebuild faced tighter credit than had been seen in a generation.
That fall, housing here was buffeted by several hundred layoffs at Chesapeake Energy Corp.
It was the tornadoes that tore Crout's heart, as it did everyone with a heart. When they struck Shawnee that May 19, Moore and south Oklahoma City the next day, leveling more than 1,300 homes, it had greater emotional impact than usual, even far from the damage: The EF5 tornado on May 20 took out two schools and killed seven elementary school pupils in Moore.
On May 24, I reported the following in The Oklahoman. It is my best memory. Let it be my memorial to Robert Crout.
Oklahoma City-area homebuilders have been called to “ministry now,” said Robert Crout, president of the Central Oklahoma Builders Association.
Crout, a Mustang land developer, emailed a message to the association's membership Thursday in response to the tornadoes on Sunday in Edmond and Shawnee and on Monday in Moore and Oklahoma City — and elsewhere across the state. It reads like a pastoral letter. “With tears flowing from a pierced heart, we all share the desire to help immediately so many whose life has been changed forever. The needs are great for those without water, food, clothing and shelter. Comfort and compassion is needed for all, especially those who have lost family and loved ones. The needs are ongoing,” Crout wrote. “I pray that God will use each of us as He cares for our neighbors in need.
“Please join me in quiet prayer. Be sensitive to God tugging at your heart. Listen for His call. Respond in His name.”
Builders, he wrote, “are uniquely prepared to help our brothers and sisters in a way few can. We are the ones who will rebuild their homes and help them restore their lives.”
Despair abounds, Crout wrote.
“But today, in the midst of utter turmoil, our profession has become our ministry, and our ministry is to provide hope even in a time like this,” he wrote. “Your next project is hope, the hope that comes with rebuilding. This is your ministry now.”
"He lived by the Golden Rule: to treat others as you would have them treat you. While I never had the opportunity to do business with Robert, I would not have hesitated — because his moral and ethical values were above approach," said his friend, south Oklahoma City developer P.B. Odom III. Amen.
Crout's funeral service will be at 2 p.m. Aug. 3 at First Baptist Church, 928 N Mustang Road, in Mustang, with burial in Mustang Cemetery under direction of McNeil's Funeral Service.