Friends remember brilliant prankster

By: Jill Beathard

Posted: 12/2/08

An Eagle Scout and member of the Boy Scout Board of the Arrow, William Nathan Rountree had dreams of attending graduate school and possibly becoming a professor.

Rountree died Nov. 5, and the cause of death has not yet been determined. He was 24.

He met girlfriend Kathy Eheman in an animal nutrition class in fall 2007.

"He was so smart, but he was so modest and humble about it. He never made you feel dumb. He tutored me, he helped me out so much," said Eheman, who graduated in August. "That's what he wanted to do, he wanted to be a professor. But it was research that he really loved doing."

"I was always surprised by how much he knew about pretty much everything," said senior biology major Derack Medel who worked with Roundtree in the lab. "We would always compete to see who could get the best grades, and he would always edge me out by about one or two points."

Family and friends remember Rountree playing lots of practical jokes. Medel said he would hook disposable camera parts up to a doorknob so that it would shock people when they grabbed it.

"He had a really good sense of humor, sometimes at the expense of others," Medel said. "We were both kind of old guys in our class, we both knew stuff from the 80s, remembered stuff from when we were kids. He was exactly like me it was weird."

The two friends worked for associate professor of horticulture science Greg Cobb, performing electron microscopy on grapes.

Cobb said that the goal of their research was to understand some of the mechanisms that control Pierce's Disease, a disease that could potentially wipe out the grapes grown in Texas. He said that Rountree's progress in learning about these mechanisms will be published in the next two months.

Rountree became involved in the life of Eheman's son, Hunter, going to his baseball and soccer games. "From the very beginning they got along great," Eheman said. "My son loved him. He had started calling him Dad."

Rountree and Eheman just returned from a trip to Florida for her niece's wedding. "Every memory is a good one. We never fought, we always had a good time together even if we were doing nothing," she said. "He was the most caring, thoughtful, considerate, sweetest guy I'd ever met."

Rountree's mother, Mona Rountree, remembered him as kind and considerate. "He helped out the person that wasn't so popular. He ran around with the popular people but he stood up for the underdog," his mother said.

Rountree played trombone in band in high school and was very involved in the youth group at Fellowship Baptist Church in Nederland, Texas, where he grew up. He also liked to play football and hunted with his dad.

"He would call home about three times a week, just because he knew he was my only son," Mona Rountree said. "He didn't have to, and he would always remind me of that."

Rountree got his Aggie ring in April. Eheman stood in line with him to get it. A close friend of Rountree told his mother that he was considering proposing to Eheman.

"She was his first true love," Mona Rountree said. "She was perfect for Nathan. She still calls and checks on us. She and her whole family came up for the funeral."

His grandparents paid for their his Aggie ring. They will also attend Silver Taps Tuesday night.

Cobb didn't treat Nathan as a student worker but let him do his work on his own. "It's wonderful to be able to do that," Cobb said. "Nathan was doing really good work. One of the few joys I have left as a professor is trying to get students to think."

"He would take charge in the lab, which was fine with me because I was scared of all the stuff," Medal said. "He was full of confidence … no matter what we had to do."

"He was Nathan," he added. "All in all I just miss him a whole lot."