March 22, 2009 by News Staff
By Blair Thomas and Jill Laster
Mickey and Wendi Sampson had two 18-month-old sons and two daughters, but a deep faith and a desire to help people drew them to Cambodia.
“He felt really deeply into their history, their years of civil war and suffering — they were oppressed for so long,” said James Sampson, Mickey’s brother. “He just wanted to help.”
Michael Lynn “Mickey” Sampson, 43, died Thursday of a heart attack, according to a news release from Resource Development International-Cambodia, a private, non-profit organization that Sampson founded and directed. Sampson died in Bangkok after being flown there from Phnom Penh, Cambodia, to see a doctor for on-going health problems he had been experiencing, according to the news release.
Sampson, a Louisville native and graduate of the University of Louisville, moved with his family to Cambodia in 1998 to work on ways to improve the country’s drinking water and sanitation.
Sampson taught as an assistant professor of chemistry at Jefferson Community and Technical College, which is now a part of the Kentucky Community and Technical Colleges System, but once fell under the UK college system. He first saw the lack of clean water in Cambodia in the 1990s while teaching chemistry there on a sabbatical from his job in Kentucky, said Luther Williams, a friend who worked alongside Sampson on different missionary projects.
“His life was a life well lived in the humble service of others,” Williams said. “I’m humbled to have called him my friend for so many years.”
RDIC would not exist without Sampson’s vision, dedication and devotion, said Marc Hall, director of operations for the organization.
Under Sampson’s leadership, RDIC established a ceramic water filter manufacture and distribution system, produced a Cambodian television series for children to promote literacy and healthy living, and worked to alert Cambodians to the risks of drinking arsenic-laden groundwater, Hall said. RDIC also has developed and implemented agricultural, water, health and educational programs in villages throughout the country.
Sarahn Chhim DeLoach, a resident of a village in Cambodia that Sampson visited with RDIC, said in an e-mail to the Kernel that the work Sampson did to develop water purification systems changed the lives of countless people.
“His work made a difference in the lives of my own family,” DeLoach. “We took 10 clay pots that purify water to a remote village in Battambang and gave them to my relatives. They were drinking from a dirty cow pond until we shared Mickey’s clay pots with them.”
No matter what, though, Sampson always found time to spend with his wife and kids.
“That’s what’s breaking my heart right now,” James Sampson said. “He would hate to be separated from his family and his wife. That would break his heart.”
Mickey Sampson’s body will be returned to Cambodia for funeral arrangements, Williams said. He is survived by his parents, Jimmy and Diane Sampson, one brother, James Sampson, his wife, Wendi, and their four children.
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