Will Alston Beinhorn, Class of 1965
Will Alston Beinhorn (SAA Class of 1965)
May 11, 1951 - December 7, 2024
Will Alston Beinhorn, a man of gentle spirit, unmatched intelligence, and profound kindness, passed away on December 7, 2024, at home from cancer. He was an avid horseman, pilot, polo player, patron of literary arts and rancher. His life was rich in accomplishment and service.
He was born in San Antonio on May 11th 1951, to William Alvin Beinhorn and Phyllis Carr Beinhorn. He graduated from San Antonio Academy in 1965 as a Battalion Commander, Texas Military Institute in 1969, and graduated from Amherst College Cum Laude in 1973, with a BA in English Literature.
Alston's professional path began as the manager of his family’s San Ysidro Ranch in Catarina, Texas from 1974 to 1975. He developed the ranch’s regenerative cattle program and pasture revitalization projects, thus beginning his lifelong study of land stewardship practices. Following the advice of a mentor who suggested all should have no less than five careers before the age of 30, he left the ranch in 1976 for San Francisco. There he co-founded the “Odalisque”, a Bay Area review of arts and politics, cementing his commitment to culture and intellectual discourse. These early diverse interests and philosophies remained with him throughout his life.
Moving to Houston in the late 1970s, and to a career in banking, he quickly settled into another professional path that would structure his life for the next three decades. He was a Vice-President at Cullen Bank and Trust in Houston, Texas, from 1977 to 1981, and at Citibank from 1981 to 2007. In 1987, he moved to Singapore with Citigroup to pioneer Citigroup's Asia Family Business for ultra-high net worth families, and served as Citibank's Global Market Manager for Singapore, Malaysia, and Brunei. Further international moves with Citigroup led him to London, England, Toronto, Canada and back to Singapore. He joined Merrill Lynch Singapore in 2008 as Managing Director, followed by Heritage Asset Management Singapore, before his retirement from banking.
Upon his return to San Antonio in 2013 and to the management of San Ysidro Ranch, Alston again actively engaged in multiple land-stewardship projects. Highlights include the implementation and practice of planting native grass seed for the restoration of native habitats throughout the ranch, and participating in Texas Parks and Wildlife Department’s Managed Lands Deer Program. He helped establish and fund a multi-year topsoil research project with the Caesar Kleberg Wildlife Research Institute and Texas A&M University- Kingsville, which provided financial support to graduate students and valuable learning opportunities for on-the-ground experience on a ranch that was deeply committed to ecological conservation.
In 2017 he established the San Ysidro Ranch Writer’s Residency Program - a month-long literary residency for published writers in fiction, poetry, or nonfiction. Housed in a ranch cabin, named the Istana by Alston (a Malay word for palace), writers were given a stipend and solitude to work amongst the peaceful scenery and daily rhythms of working ranch life. As part of the program’s requirements, authors gave readings at the Dimmit County Library and Carrizo Springs High School, thus sharing Alston’s love of literature with the greater community.
Horses were Alston’s lifelong passion. He started playing polo whilst at Cullen Bank, at the suggestion of his father. Disabused of the notion his father was going to supply the ponies, Alston, a superb horseman, invested forty-five years into the sport- trading his way from modest beginnings, building teams, maintaining barns throughout that time at disparate locations on three continents and eventually establishing a renowned breeding operation, San Ysidro Polo, in Orchard, TX, with his beloved homebred stallion Chilo. Even before moving to Singapore, his love of the sport took him to South East Asia, captaining the Citibank polo team to play high goal matches against the Sultan of Brunei. He also played many Pahang Classics Polo Tournaments with his team “Texas”, against the various Sultans and Princes in Malaysian states of Johor and Pahang, and he kept ponies in New Delhi, India, playing in Delhi, Chennai, and Jaipur. Over the years, was an active member of the Houston Polo Club, Retama in San Antonio, Cowdray Park Polo Club in London, and of the venerable 100-year-old Singapore Polo Club, at which he not only played thrice weekly, but was variously the Polo Captain, Treasurer and Vice President of the club.
He was fascinated with flight and took flying lessons first whilst managing the San Ysidro Ranch in the 1970s, and he continued following his passion for decades and when possible, taking flying up again during various international postings. At Goodwood Park Aerodrome on the English South Downs, in Toronto, Canada and finally again in San Antonio. Alston was a licensed Private Pilot with almost 2,000 hours.
He held several board positions chiefly as Treasurer for the Nueces River Authority and the Alta Vista Neighborhood Association.
Cherished by his wife, Holly Tupper; from New York City (to whom he was introduced on a blind date set up by the former Social Editor of the San Antonio Express News; Bonnie Sue Dilwoth Jacobs) and further survived by his daughters, Summer LeFauve and Camille Beinhorn, husbands, partners and grandchildren, and his sister, Courtney Beinhorn Dunk and her children and grandchild, and a community that he enriched with his generous spirit. He will be dearly missed, as a friend has said…
.. "Alston had a gift of bringing people into his world, connecting with them and sharing it. I feel forever blessed that Alston shared so much with me."
Service for family and close friends will be held. In lieu of flowers, memorial contribution in Alston’s name to Caesar Kleberg Wildlife Research Institute, Texas A&M University-Kingsville, 700 University Blvd, MSC 218, Kingsville, Texas 78363, https://www.ckwri.tamuk.edu/giving.
Originally published by Porter Loring on December 9, 2024.
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