Remembering Benjamin Joseph Lednicky, Jr. '62
By Michael Murphy
Associate professor of Landscape Architecture
Landscape architects and Texas A&M lost an old friend March 5, 2008 with the death of Benjamin J. Lednicky, Jr. of Houston. He was a lifelong Aggie fan and a member of the Corps of Cadets Army Company E-2, and served as a commissioned officer after graduation. He also acted as his class agent from 1977 until 1982. Ben, whose father, Ben J. Lednicky ’37 was also a landscape architect, was one of the early proponents of professional registration in Texas, and in 1969 after its adoption by the Texas Legislature, was honored by receiving landscape architecture registration number 15, just one number behind his father who had number 14. Ben was a both a proud son and a father of Aggies having both a daughter, ReNae Rogers Scott ‘87 (Bachelor of Environmental Design), and son, Kyle Lednicky ‘98, graduate from Texas A&M.
In the early 1970s Ben, who had designed award-winning projects when working for Morman Mok and Green, formed his own firm, Benjamin Lednicky and Associates, Landscape Architects. He was a frequent visitor to campus, at one time buying a farm with an old house near town to have a place to stay when he came to ball games. The property was later acquired by the city and is today College Station's Central Park. Ben’s was the last class to spend their studio years in the Academic Building, before the Architecture Building was completed in 1963, and he always enjoyed reminiscing about his days there.
He devoted much of his life to the service to his profession, his university, and his community. He received a governor’s appointment as a member of the Texas Board of Architectural Examiners, serving for a number of years as vice chair. He was an advisory trustee with the Lady Bird Johnson National Wildflower Research Center, a member of the Texas Capitol Grounds Advisory Committee, a founding member of the Southwest Houston A&M Club and vice president of the Association of Former Students. He was widely credited with successfully encouraging the university administration to initiate an ambitious renovation of the campus grounds in preparation for the University Centennial in 1975. Many of the improvements we enjoy on campus today were the result of his lobbying to bring them about.
In addition to his long service to Texas A&M and his profession, Ben found time to be an active member of his community. He was a founding owner of the Texas Opry House and heavily involved with volunteer organizations: Ben Johnson Roping and Cutting (for Cystic Fibrosis), Red Adair-Jackie Sherrill Charity Golf Tournament, Theatre Under the Stars, Alley Theatre, Pin Oak Charity Horse Show, and Houston Livestock Show and Rodeo, for which he received a lifetime membership in 2007. He was particularly proud of winning the Houston Livestock Show and Rodeo World Champion Barbeque Contest in 1978 as a member of the Heritage Hill Ranch and Cattle Co.
Ben will be missed by those who knew him and will remain a model of the kind of service that has made Texas A&M the institution it is today. His family suggests that memorials be made to the Fort Bend County A&M Scholarship Fund, PO Box 77496, attn: Ben Lednicky Scholarship Fund or to the National Multiple Sclerosis Society.
