Joe Grady Moore, Jr.

MOORE JR., JOE GRADY (1924 ~ 2005). Joe Grady Moore, Jr., lifelong public servant, Purple Heart recipient, and educator, was born August 6, 1924, in Bagwell, Red River County, Texas, to Joe Grady Moore, Sr. and Clara Bell Spell.

In 1943, he served with the 84th Infantry Division of the U.S. Army during WWII as a frontline medic. In November 1944, he was shot by a German sniper in northeast Belgium and received the Purple Heart Medal for his service.

After graduation, Moore worked as a Research Assistant to the Texas Legislative Council from 1950-1952, where he assisted in the preparation of comprehensive analyses of state tax laws. From 1952-1959, Moore served as the Executive Director to the Texas Industrial Accident Board where he prepared new legislation, presented budgets, explained legislation to the House and Senate Committees and interpreted Workmen's Compensation laws to lawyers, insurance companies, employers and employees. Moore then went on to study law at the University of Texas from 1959-1965, and again in 1989; cumulating 80 hours. During his studies he served as Administrative Assistant to Governor Price Daniel from 1960-1961. From 1961-1962, Moore worked as the Finance Examiner for the Coordinating Board of Texas College and University Systems, formerly known as the Texas Commission for Higher Education. In 1963, Moore began work as the Chief Budget Examiner and Administrative Assistant to Governor John Connally.

Moore then went on to serve as the Executive Director of the Texas Water Development Board and was also elected Chairman of the Texas Water Quality Board, formerly known as the Texas Water Pollution Control Board, in 1965. In 1968, Moore served as Commissioner for the Federal Water Pollution Control Administration and then in 1969, he became Vice President of Municipal Finance, Eastman Dillon, Union Securities and Company.

In 1970, Moore became President of Aquarius, Inc. The Clean Water Company and in 1973, became the Director of the Office of Research at the Lyndon Baines Johnson School of Public Affairs at the University of Texas in Austin. Afterwards, from 1973-1976, Moore worked as the Program Director for the National Commission on Water Quality. In 1975, Moore became a Lifetime Member of the Water Environment Federation. After his term as Program Director, Moore taught as a Professor of the Graduate Program in Environmental Science at the University of Texas in Dallas, until 1979, when he worked as Assistant Administrator to Detroit, Michigan Wastewater Treatment Plant.

In 1986, Moore was honored at the Blue Ribbon Environmental Panel in Austin, Texas. From 1989 to 1990, Moore worked as a consultant to BCM Engineers, Inc. where he taught Environmental Laws and Regulations at the Brookhaven College in Dallas, Texas.

In 1991, Moore served as Chief Executive Officer and Chairman of the Board for Process Data Control Corporation and in 1993, Moore was the recipient of the Charles Alvin Emerson Medal for outstanding personal service in the water environment industry by the Water Environment Federation. From 1994-1996, Moore served as a Monitor in the Sierra Club's suit against the U.S. Interior Department over management of the Edwards Aquifer. The suit claimed continued pumping of the aquifer's groundwater during low rainfall damaged several endangered species. In 1996, a scholarship was anonymously established in honor of Joe G. and Jerry Moore in the Department of Geography at Texas State University in San Marcos; where he became a Distinguished Professor in that same department of said university. Also, from 1996 to 2005, Moore became the Director of Freshwater Research and Policy Center at Texas State University, and in 1999, earned the Excellence in Teaching Award for the Department of Geography.

From 2001-2005, he became Distinguished Professor at the Biology Department at Texas State University. He was nominated for an honorary Doctorate degree at Texas State University and also, he was amongst the first inductees in the Red River County Hall of Fame in Clarksville, Texas, in 2002.

Joe Moore worked to the end, educating students at a graduate class in environmental law, regulation, and public policy at Texas State University the night before his death . Besides his service to the public and students, he also served as a deacon and Sunday school teacher at First Baptist Church in Austin where he and his wife joined in the early 1950s.

Joe Moore, Jr. passed away in his sleep at home in Austin, Texas on March 11, 2005, and was interred in the State Cemetery March 15, 2005.