ZAFRA — More at home taking in the glories of God’s great outdoors, Riley Donica’s eyes adjusted slowly to the dim light of the seamy tavern. The preacher was no stranger to seeking out lost souls. But this time, instead of his Bible, he had brought his pistol.

A few nights before, somebody had burned Donica’s new church to the ground. And not only was he sure who did it — a gang of enterprising local thieves he had denounced in an article — he knew exactly where he could find them. As the faces he sought materialized out of the dimness, Donica strode to the bar, laid his gun on it, then, in his sternest pulpit voice, he spoke up. “I told them the rest of the town was buffaloed by them and were afraid of reprisals,” Donica told the Tulsa World several years later.

“But then I said that I wasn’t afraid and that I was a better shot than any man in the room.” Having always taken a dim view of what he called “lawlessness,” the preacher had pretty good reason. When he was 21, his own father had been killed, shot in the back of the head by a drunken neighbor. His stepfather would also die violently, shot in the gut in a confrontation with thieves after he was deputized to help stop them. So for Riley Donica, crime was always personal.

The tough talk at the tavern did the trick; Donica said he had no more trouble after that. Church members rebuilt their facility, this time with rock instead of wood. It’s still standing today. Donica’s reputation is still standing, too, along with the colorful legacy of the man known alternately as “the mountain man preacher,” “the pistol packin’ preacher” and “the flying minister.”

The Rev. Dalton Riley Donica, a onetime candidate for the U.S. Senate, died July 23. He was 77. Searchers found his body on his property near Zafra, where he had been riding his horse. The cause of death has not been determined, though he appeared to have collapsed after hacking through some brush.

A funeral service is set for 2 p.m. Monday at First Baptist Church in Mena, Ark. Beasley-Wood Funeral Home of Mena is handling arrangements.

Born and raised in the Kiamichi Mountains of southeasternOklahoma, Donica made the rugged area the center of his ministry work. “He was never intimidated by the fact that he lived in Nowheresville,” his daughter Robin Wolaver said. “He loved the land and he loved his guns and he was determined to stay the course.” A rough-cut, open-range rancher and a rural school teacher, Riley Donica’s father and mother had been a mismatched pair, said Wolaver, who is writing a book about her father.

“But I think God brought them together specifically to make my father: Because of his dad, he could relate to the cowboy, hillbilly, backwoods element. His love for reading and poetry and learning came from his mother.”

The violent deaths of his father, Bill Donica, and his stepfather, Tex Prior, were seminal. The wild, mountainous area had long been a haven for criminals, and Riley Donica would lead anti-crime efforts.

Usually, though, he led with his faith rather than his firearms.

His primary church for 52 years was the Zafra Church of Christ. He also served as director of the Kiamichi Mountains Christian Mission, which establishes churches over a 3,000-square-mile area of southeast Oklahoma and western Arkansas. Those boundaries did not contain Donica, though.

A licensed pilot who once traded a refurbished Volkswagen for his first plane, Donica flew all over the country to hold revival services. For more than two decades, he ran the Kiamichi Mission’s annual men’s retreat near Honobia, a gathering that combined religion and conservative politics, drawing several thousand attendees each year. The embodiment of the rugged American individualist, Donica in 1978 made the leap from the pulpit to the political stump.

He ran unsuccessfully for the U.S. Senate as an independent, taking on Democrat David Boren and Republican Robert Kamm. Tieless and in a straw cowboy hat, Donica piloted his Cessna 182 around the state to campaign, quoting scripture and denouncing liberal economics and big government in a soft but eloquent southern drawl.

“He was criticized for mixing politics and religion. But to him these were all spiritual issues at their bedrock,” his daughter said.

Paul Harvey, the radio legend and Tulsa native, spoke at one of Riley’s retreats. He later did one of his famous radio commentaries on Donica, praising him as an American original.

Retired Enid minister Joe Wilson, who now devotes his time to building chapels in Oklahoma prisons, a project Donica had promoted, said Donica was his hero. “He was a man’s man and had this persona about him that men liked to be around,” he said. “He was my role model all my life.”

Recently, when a poor family with little insurance saw their mobile home burn down, Donica single-handedly secured donations of money and materials and had a Christian building ministry build them a new home, Wilson said. “That was the way he was,” he said.

An expert bush pilot, Donica had participated many times in mountain search-and-rescues. The search for Donica drew support like few others, including two airplanes, a helicopter and some 150 volunteers.

His horse, Old Red, and his dog, Brusky, were still with his body when it was discovered.

Donica died with his boots and spurs on, in an old pair of jeans and with his pistol on his hip, Wolaver said.

He is survived by wife Jane Donica; son David Donica; daughters Cynthia Perkins, Sherry McKim and Robin Wolaver; 17 grandchildren; nine great-grandchildren; brother Rod Donica and sister Katie Donica.

Read more from this Tulsa World article at http://www.tulsaworld.com/ourlives/article.aspx?subjectid=58&articleid=20100725_11_A19_TheRev970896