User:Professor Pendark

Brief Family History:

Pendark is the alter-ego of magician, writer, lecturer, Richard M. Dyson-Bateman. He was born on July 3, 1971 in Portland, Oregon. His mother Janet Dyson-Bateman, is a first generation American, born in Lowestoft, Suffolk, England in 1950. His step-father is Robert Terry Bateman, born in Utah in 1950. They married when he was four years of age. He has three syblings, Laura, Andrew, and Joshua. His maternal grandparents immigrated to America from England in 1952. His adopted grandparents have always lived in the United States. He uses the hyphenation in his name to honor both sides of the family. Mr. Bateman has been married three times and has two children. One of the children is a daughter, now an adult, from whom he is estranged. The other is Charles Robert Bateman, also the son of his wife Mary Michelle Williams-Bateman, to whom he was married in 2002. They live in Cedar Park, Texas.

Who He Is:

Professor is an honorary title that was given to Mr. Bateman by a particularly inebriated patron of a performance of mind reading and fortune telling that was being given a The Museum of the Weird in Austin,Texas. After having given a direct cold read of the patron, the intoxicated gentleman shouted for all in the crowd to hear, "Way to tell my whole life there, professor!"

Note: Cold Reading is the art used by mentalists, wherein they give a complete reading of the personality traits, life choices, aspirations, and possible future decisions of a given individual. In this particular case, the methods used, (which will not be revealed here) were similar to those used by card readers, crystal gazers, and palmists.

Where He Has Been:''

Pendark began his career performing magic tricks at Evergreen Junior Highschool in Utah. He had a brief partnership with Kenneth Lunn under the name Batman and Lunn. This lasted roughly a year before they parted ways and moved on to other things. He has been an extra in two large scale film productions, and performed countless birthday parties throughout the Mountain West. Pendark has been featured as a makeup artist, set builder, character actor, and variety performer at Rocky Point Hanted House, Night Terrors Haunted House, and Mansion of Terror. He performed one season at Scream Hollow Texas, was featured for a year at Museum of the Weird, and now runs his own show called Professor Pendark's Family & Friends Traveling Show.

Day Job, Hobbies, and Volunteer Work:

Mr. Bateman currently works for the Texas Department of Criminal Justce, in the Victim Services Department. He is a Cler IV on the Hotline staff, where he assists victims callers by facilitating their ability to be informed about their offender, being a part of the parole process, and remaining informed about the offender after parole. He has also begun helping to create webinar training modules for the department.

In his spare time, Mr. Bateman is the acting Adjutant of the Capital Area Young Marines, which is his local branch of The Young Marines. The organization was started in the 1960's by The Marine Corps League, as a way to provide youth with leadership training, community service experience, and personal growth. Mr. Bsteman performs records keeping duties as well as assisting with the creation of classes. He performs various other duties assisting with campouts, community service projects, and boot camps.

He has also served as a sunday school teacher, worked in food kitchens, and donated time as well as money to various charitable causes.