Kent Hance’s announced retirement shouldn’t come as a surprise to anyone.

The former Texas state senator, congressman, railroad commissioner and now university administrator has been in the public eye since The Flood, or so it seems. He’s outgoing, gregarious, funny as the dickens, homespun yet sophisticated and he carries himself with a West Texas aplomb that is impossible to duplicate.

Texas Tech University’s chancellor is retiring next year and will assume the role as “chancellor emeritus,” whatever that means.

http://www.texastribune.org/2013/10/11/kent-hance-to-step-down-as-texas-tech-chancellor/

A university chancellor’s main role is to raise money. Hance surely could do that.

The native of Dimmitt has a unique place in Texas political history: He is the only politician ever to defeat George W. Bush for elective office, doing so in 1978 when both men were running for the West Texas congressional seat being vacated by the legendary U.S. Rep. George Mahon. Hance was a Democrat back then, but he would switch to the Republican Party years later.

My association with Hance goes back to my first year in Texas. In 1984, I arrived at my post in Beaumont to work on the editorial page of the Beaumont Enterprise. Hance was running for the U.S. Senate seat being vacated by the late Sen. John Tower.

In that year’s Democratic primary for the Senate seat, Hance finished second in a three-way near dead heat with state Sen. Lloyd Doggett and former U.S. Rep. Bob Krueger. Doggett would beat Hance in a runoff a few weeks later. Hance came to Beaumont to try to persuade the newspaper to endorse his candidacy and I was blown away by the man’s wit and charm.

I had heard the stories about his campaign in 1978 when he put on his good ol’ boy charm to beat Bush for the West Texas seat in Congress. He brought it with him to Beaumont in 1984 as well. Indeed, he has kept it all through his public life.

His time at Tech’s helm was marked with plenty of success. The school is setting student enrollment records seemingly every year. He came to Amarillo a couple of years ago to declare that, in his view, Texas Tech ought to consider expanding its medical center complex in Amarillo to a full four-year medical school.

An expansion, he said, would require Amarillo to demonstrate it can support such a move.

I don’t yet know where that will go. My hope is that as chancellor emeritus, Hance will be able to keep that flame burning.

Thank you for your service, Kent.