My heart sank at news of a “silver alert” last night about Jack Fryer, 71, and his brother, Robert, 58. They were missing from a home in Conway County and authorities feared danger. The worst news came true. Today’s THV reports:

CONWAY COUNTY, Ark. (KTHV) – According to the Conway County Sheriff Mike Smith, he Silver Alert has been cancelled on Robert and Jack Fryer Jr.

Robert Fryer was located in North Little Rock and questioned at the Pulaski County Sheriff’s Office by the Conway County and Arkansas State Police investigators. During the interview with Robert Fryer, he admitted to Investigators to causing the death of his brother Jack Fryer Jr.

During this same time, Conway County Officials were conducting a search warrant at the property of Jack Fryer Jr. It was at this time that deputies found what are believed to be bone fragments in a burn barrel. Those remains will be sent to the Arkansas State Crime Lab Medical Examiners Office for positive identification

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Jack Fryer was a well-known figure around town, known to all as Daddy Jack. He was a star football lineman in his high school days at Hall, a musician, a legendary brawler and a monumental drinker who turned his life over to AA and led many others to sobriety. Is it really true that Daddy Jack once physically subdued an All-American lineman in his days at Fayetteville? Is it true that he explained to a police officer after ramming into a campus building in a speeding car that he was in a hurry to get to a liquor store before closing? No matter. He was the stuff such legends are made of and stories of those he helped are equally legion. I found it impossible not to like Daddy Jack, though I sometimes wasn’t a fan of some of his ideas.

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The silver alert had indicated his brother was troubled (a relative’s Facebook post said he’d been diagnosed years ago as schizophrenic). Was he one last person Daddy Jack tried unsuccessfully to rescue? 

He passed through our pages not long ago as an advocate for halfway houses in residential neighborhoods for people seeking work and sobriety.

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