Osmond “Buck” Breland, III

Osmond Philip “Buck” Breland, III, 29, a Houston and Austin, Tex. native, who was studying at Princeton Theological Seminary (PTS), died on November 8, after a seven-year battle with Hodgkin’s Lymphoma, at the Robert Wood Johnson University Hospital in New Brunswick, N.J.

He was the husband of Michele McLaughlin, who grew up in Newtown.

Buck was born on August 7, 1970 in Houston, Tex. He graduated with honors from Westlake High School in 1989 where he was a class officer. Despite his illness, his accomplishments were many. He graduated with honors from the University of Texas at Austin in 1993 with a bachelor’s degree in government.

In 1997, he and Michele earned graduate degrees from the Lyndon Baines Johnson (LBJ) School of Public Affairs in Austin, Tex., where they met. His studies focused on health care policy, including his professional report, Tobacco Regulation: A Primer for Texas Municipal Governments. The report recommended comprehensive tobacco ordinances for cities committed to preventing tobacco use among their youth. At graduation, he was selected by his LBJ School classmates to deliver the commencement address.

Buck was a devoted member of the University Baptist Church in Austin, Tex. and served as a pastoral associate at Kingston United Methodist Church in Princeton, N.J.

In addition to his wife, he is survived by his brother, Patrick Breland; his mother, Linda Breland Ward; and his father, Osmond Philip Breland, Jr. Buck would want his in-laws, Denny and Gladys McLaughlin, as well as his sisters-in-law, Rosalie and Elizabeth McLaughlin, to be remembered as part of his family as they assisted his wife, Michele, as caregivers and friends during his illness.

Donations in his memory may be made to the Cancer Institute of New Jersey, 195 Little Albany Street, New Brunswick, NJ 08901; MD Anderson Cancer Center, PO Box 297153, Houston, TX 77287; and Universal Health Care Action Network (UHCAN!), 2800 Euclid, Suite 520, Cleveland, OH 44115-2418.

The Newtown Bee      November 26, 1999