W.S. "Babe" Howard (1926-2008)
posted by Common at
1:26 PM
Friday, July 11, 2008
About Me
- Name: Common
- Location: Memphis, TN., United States
If you like what you see tell somebody else. If you don't tell me. I'm a Christian, Black, Independent Conservative which I think will be reflected in my posts.
Previous Posts
- He Might Be Too Late
- Cash Be Careful
- Caught On Tape
- Predictable
- Bear Down On Crime
- Sounds Like Bribery
- Larry Hanson "Bozo" (1925-2008)
- Don't Bring It Over Here
- Makes Good Use Of Time
- Playground Politics
Subscribe to
Posts [Atom]
Free-IQTest.net - Online IQ Test>
> 
8 Comments:
For those who don't know who he is:
W. S. 'Babe' Howard dies
By Tom Bailey Jr. (Contact), Memphis Commercial Appeal
Originally published 11:16 a.m., July 11, 2008
Updated 12:10 p.m., July 11, 2008
W.S. “Babe” Howard, one of the Mid-South’s most colorful and consequential civic leaders, died this morning after a long illness.
He was 82, having led his family owned Millington Telephone Co. since his father died 1953.
The nickname: When he was an infant, the family maid thought “William Stuart” was too cumbersome and called him “Baby.” That changed to “Babe” six years later when his sister, Bessie Lucille, was born.
Position: President and general manager of Millington Telephone Co. since 1953
A sampling of his accomplishments:
Built USA Stadium, home field for USA Olympic and National teams from 1988 to 1998
Alderman for 19 years
First president of Millington Chamber of Commerce; twice honored as the Chamber’s “Man of the Year’’
Shelby County School Board member for 17 years
Started restoration of old section of Millington, including the Harrold Store building that’s now a state landmark
Founded International Goat Days festival in 1990
Renovated and donated city’s oldest frame house for use by Chamber of Commerce
Past chairman of Tennessee Wildlife Resources Agency
Military: Served 1944-1946 in Europe during World War II and occupation
Family: Married to Ann Anderson Howard from 1948 until her death in 2002; four children, six grandchildren, five great-grandchildren
Although Mr. Howard was folksy and drawled like the molasses he made, he devoured books and fed his own curiosity in ways that benefited everyone from nature enthusiasts to base ball players to the business owners.
He loved fainting goats, so he founded an annual festival called International Goat Days.
He revered the past, so he restored some of Millington’s oldest buildings, sold sorghum molasses he made the old-fashioned way, and opened a restaurant named Old Timers.
He liked what baseball could do for the youth playing it, so he built a stadium good enough for the USA Olympic team.
He took seriously the spirit of Santa Claus, so for 50 years he presented a St. Nick who wowed local kids by somehow knowing the names of their teachers and toys on their wish lists.
He revered nature and wildlife, so he personally risked $4 million to ensure 4,076 pristine acres went to the Wolf River Conservancy and State of Tennessee instead of loggers and developers.
He was as comfortable chairing the Tennessee Wildlife Resources Agency as taking his usual chair in the lunchroom of the telephone company on Navy Road.
Everyone from U.S. congress men to his blue-collar friends would bustle through the kitchen/lunchroom, which is probably why he preferred having his work space there.
He didn’t make appointments, said the phone company’s plant manager, Albert Hutcheson. “Drive by, if his car is there he’s probably in there.”
Ginny Music, his secretary from 1960 to 1991, recalled Howard as “a people person.”
He could afford tailored business suits, but wore khaki work clothes, brogans with white socks, and wide suspenders.
They were more comfortable.
In fact, if Mr. Howard attend ed a funeral, wedding or formal meeting, he’d bring his coat and tie in his car, slip them on at the last minute at a gas station near the event, then change again on the way back, Music said.
But there was another reason he wore work clothes.
“He didn’t want people to think he was better than they were,” Music said.
Lifelong Millington resident Dennis Wages said Howard “judged not by the cut of your suit, but the quality of man you are...
“He serves a population of people who are working people. And that’s his friends.”
His appearance sometimes fooled people who make assumptions.
Music recalled accompanying Mr. Howard decades ago to Memphis to buy a new car at a Lincoln dealership.
Wearing his usual working- man’s clothes, Howard walked around the showroom, but no salesman ever approached.
“Finally, he said, ‘To hell with it, let’s get out of here,’ ’’ Music recalled. He went to another dealership where a salesman met him at the door and made an easy sale.
Mr. Howard engaged himself fully with his community, serving 19 years as a Millington alderman, 17 years on the Shelby County School Board and with many other government and civic organizations.
Not everyone adored Mr. Howard. He could be stubborn in getting his way and lose a temper that would make his lips tremble and ears turn red.
He lost a re-election bid for alderman in 1984 when he tried unsuccessfully to have Millington Central High School principal Joe Morton transferred.
So later that year he resigned his school board seat on principle, saying he no longer rep resented the sentiments of most his constituents.
“You either like Babe or you don’t like him,” Music said, adding some were simply jealous.
But his acts of kindness and generosity to people who needed a hand were far too many to count or too quiet to know about, Music said.
Many insisted on writing him IOU’s, but he hardly ever bothered to look in the envelope that held them in her desk drawer, she said.
"Babe was as gentle and kind a man as one will ever meet," U.S. Rep. John Tanner said. "I know of no one who gave more to his community -- from Goat Days to USA Baseball. He was a generous, civic-minded citizen who made Millington and West Tennessee a better place to live."
Mr. Howard was a national leader in the community of in dependent telephone companies.
He turned to the founder of another independent, Century Telephone in Louisiana, to get him out of a jam in the mid- 1990s.
Some of Mr. Howard’s relatives sued so they could sell their controlling interest in Millington Telephone to a Chicago holding company for $25 million.
Not wanting to sell, Mr. Howard settled with them out of court, borrowing the $25 million from Century Telephone’s Clarke Williams.
Struggling to repay that loan, Mr. Howard in 1997 sold his 25 percent interest in the local, 13- county franchise of BellSouth Mobility.
He didn’t reveal at the time how much he received from Bell South, but had said in 1995 that his share was worth $48 million.
But it was people, not money, that made Mr. Howard happy, friends said.
Mr. Howard didn’t open the popular Old Timer’s restaurant to turn a buck, but to create a gathering spot, Hutcheson indicated.
“If you were ever at Old Timers when he goes in and he starts table hopping, I’d say that would be right up there at the top,” Hutcheson said.
“I almost think that was the sole purpose, to draw people to gether and have a place to go and mix with them on a regular basis.”
Mr. Howard cared for people all his adult life.
As a young man who raced cars for a hobby, he often sped people to the hospital in his own vehicle.
Wages recalled as a child seeing Mr. Howard climb a telephone pole on Navy Road to try to save an employee who had been electrocuted.
Howard and another man ad ministered CPR and he brought the victim down on his shoulder.
“To see Mr. Howard up that pole trying to saving that young man’s life... leaves an impression about the type individual he was,” Wages said.
Wages was a USA Baseball volunteer when the Cuban national team came to play. Wages had put out up to 15 bars of soap in the locker room, but the next day all the soap was gone.
“I said, ‘Mr. Howard, they’re taking our soap.’
“He said, ‘Put more out.’”
Same thing happened with the toilet paper.
Next day, the extra soap and toilet paper were gone again.
“He realized that they could not easily get soap and toilet pa per in Cuba and they were taking it home,” Wages said.
“He saw the problem way before I saw the problem. And nothing was ever said about it (to the Cubans.)”
Mr. Howard, Wages said, helped families who couldn’t pay their phone bill.
Supplied choir robes to churches.
Put little league teams in uniforms.
Sponsored girls softball in a big way.
“And there’s so many we’ll never know about, the people he’s helped.”
1:42 PM
He was a good man with a kind heart. He will be missed.
He was a local hero. That's why I posted the article.
City of Millington stops as 'Babe' passes
Originally published 03:42 p.m., July 14, 2008
Updated 03:42 p.m., July 14, 2008
Millington gave W.S. `Babe’ Howard a remarkable funeral procession during the noon hour today.
Motorists voluntarily stopped along bustling U.S. 51 as the long caravan drove five miles through town, from First Baptist Church to Northridge Woodhaven Cemetery.
Stuart Howard carries the casket of his father W.S. 'Babe" Howard from the funeral through an honor guard from the Millington police and fire departments at the First Baptist Church in Millington.
Video
Police cars leapfrogged to intersections, sirens blaring and motors roaring.
The Fire Department’s large ladder truck led the white hearse.
The procession began by passing under the extended, crossed arms of two bucket trucks, a fitting arch for the owner of Millington Telephone Co.
Retail workers and customers stepped out to the curb, standing as if at attention.
It was as if the townspeople, even in their workaday mode of a Monday lunch hour, realized that an era was passing by, not just “Babe.”
Howard, 82, died Friday after a long illness.
He was a civic leader whose contributions to the town were colorful, plentiful and often unusual.
A very few include: a goat festival; a baseball stadium and baseball events that would befit a much larger city; a venue for visits with Santa; and restoration of the city’s oldest frame house for the Chamber of Commerce.
But it was the quiet help Howard gave to countless individuals over the years that endeared him to so many.
Like a homeless man named Roy David Randall, who lived in a field Howard owned behind the Millington’s Kroger’s.
Rev. Kenneth Uselton of First Methodist Church told hundreds attending Monday’s funeral service that Howard not only clothed the man, he built him a small shelter and connected it to running water.
Uselton said Howard called him for help just after Randall died. “Babe requested a service of celebration for the life, death and resurrection of Roy,” Uselton said. They held the service near the tiny dwelling Howard had built.
“Babe has set for you and me an example of how to love, reach out and offer hospitality to your neighbor,” Uselton said.
roshe run, lululemon outlet, celine handbags, nfl jerseys, ugg, asics shoes, insanity workout, giuseppe zanotti, hollister, nike huarache, longchamp, ugg outlet, ugg soldes, uggs outlet, canada goose outlet, mont blanc pens, babyliss pro, canada goose outlet, canada goose, p90x workout, ghd, instyler ionic styler, marc jacobs outlet, beats headphones, chi flat iron, vans outlet, jimmy choo shoes, ugg boots, birkin bag, soccer jerseys, ferragamo shoes, abercrombie and fitch, valentino shoes, mcm handbags, new balance outlet, mac cosmetics, reebok shoes, nike trainers, bottega veneta, soccer shoes, canada goose outlet, north face jackets, herve leger, wedding dresses, rolex watches, uggs on sale, north face outlet
timberland shoes, ugg, ralph lauren, supra shoes, wedding dress, parajumpers outlet, uggs canada, louboutin, converse, moncler, vans, canada goose, lancel, toms outlet, coach outlet, hollister canada, moncler, links of london uk, moncler outlet, swarovski jewelry, pandora uk, juicy couture outlet, karen millen, iphone 6 case, pandora charms, canada goose uk, hollister clothing, nike air max, ray ban, air max, gucci, montre femme, thomas sabo uk, canada goose, baseball bats, hollister, moncler, louis vuitton canada, pandora jewelry, canada goose pas cher, moncler, juicy couture outlet, moncler, replica watches, swarovski uk, oakley, moncler, converse shoes
moncler outlet
nike chaussure
nike factory
bears jerseys
golden goose
moncler jackets
ralph lauren outlet
ralph lauren uk
salomon
nike air max 95 ultra
zzzzz2018.6.8
0810jejeadidas zx flux bronze Nike Shox nike air jordan 4 iv retro noir rouge gris Qualifier une autre société de sneaker chaussure nike femme 2017 cortez célèbre. L'autre problème possible asics gel lyte 3 femme pas cher est la barrière du savoir-faire nike homme solde technologique. Il devrait être éviter asics fuji trabuco homme decathlon de porter dans un environnement avis site nike free run 2 france non naturel, par exemple, basket nike homme a scratch la journée pluvieuse, neigeuse air jordan 11 retro price philippines et le tarmac avec une température new balance soldes running importante sous le grand soleil.
Post a Comment
Subscribe to Post Comments [Atom]
<< Home