- Date Of Birth: December 20, 1933
- Date Of Death: October 15, 2022
- State: Arizona
On October 15, 2022 our family lost our guiding light, our confidant, our best friend. Leroy was in hospice care and tragically passed after a brief battle with pneumonia and heart disease. By his side was the love of his life, his wife of 69 years, Sammy Townsend.
Born on December 20, 1933 in Lubbock, Texas. Leroy was the second of six children of LB and Ocie Townsend. Leroy was raised in Bronco, Texas where he was active in football, basketball and track. Early on he showed a love of education and graduated High School at just 16 years old. He spent his youth working on the family farm, rodeoing and later wildcatting as the derrick man on oil rigs in the west Texas desert plains.
From west Texas, a football scholarship took him to New Mexico Highlands University. Leroy completed his B.S. degree in 1955 with a double major in chemistry and mathematics. He then completed his M.S. in chemistry in 1957. While at New Mexico Highlands he also met and later married Sammy Beames.
After graduation he volunteered for duty in the U.S. Navy’s Officer Training School. Following commissioning as an officer, he volunteered for the very challenging one-year training program to become a deep sea and SCUBA diver and underwater ordnance disposal expert. He was assigned to the U.S.S. Mulberry which was an ordnance recovery and diving ship with the only floating double lock decompression chamber on the West Coast. His initial duties were restricted to being the Explosive Ordnance Disposal (E.O.D.) and diving officer. However -following a pattern to be repeated several times in his professional career- even though Leroy came aboard as the lowest ranking officer (ensign), he served in essentially every department on board the ship and left the Navy in 1960 as the ship’s commanding officer.
Following his four-year Navy career, Leroy obtained his Medicinal Chemistry from Arizona State University in 1965 under the mentorship of R.K. Robins.
Leroy had a long and distinguished career as a heterocyclic and nucleoside chemist. He also worked extensively and collaborated in biology, biochemistry, parasitology, and virology. For a single individual to discover drugs which may be used to treat a diversity of conditions including parasitic diseases, cancer, herpes, and AIDS is significant and unusual. One of the drugs for which he was co-inventor was recently approved in the U.S. and Europe for the treatment of cytomegalovirus infections. Leroy had a great ability to lead and inspire students and collaborators with his considerable knowledge in both chemistry and relevant biology. He was dedicated to his students and to teaching. He taught pharmacy students, undergraduate and graduate medicinal chemistry students, and undergraduate and graduate chemistry students with distinction. His Saturday morning research group meetings were a virtual institution with his students and postdoctoral fellows.
Along with his students and collaborators he published 593 papers, many of which were applied to problems in infectious disease and cancer. He is also the holder of more than 200 patents. In addition to his active research program he was dedicated to the field of medicinal chemistry.
Leroy retired in Sedona, Arizona where he enjoyed a busy and full retirement with Sammy. He volunteered with many community groups, including the Rotary and local food bank. He especially enjoyed his 14 years of volunteering with the Sedona Police Department and the many friends he made there.
His Friday lunches with the One Barrel oil club were always a highlight of his week. His humor and fun loving spirit were legendary with everyone.
Leroy loved University of Michigan football, Mexican food, country western music and travel. He would tell all his family and friends to enjoy every day to the fullest, read as many books as you can, see the world, and make your life spectacular!
His love for his academic career was only surpassed by his devotion to his family. He supported and loved us all unconditionally. He leaves a great void and will be forever missed.
Preceded in death by his parents, a sister Evas, his brothers, Calvin, John, Melvin and a daughter in law Linda.
He is survived by his beloved wife, Sammy.
Two children Lisa Loree (Rick Kopenhefer), Leroy Byron
Six grandchildren, Kelly, Cameron, Dana, Billy, Joshua and Emily
Two great grandchildren, Clara and James
In 2003 the Leroy B. Townsend Medicinal Chemistry graduate student fund was established.
This fund honors his distinguished career and is intended to support graduate students in Medicinal Chemistry at the University of Michigan.
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