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A brief biography Clyde Nolen Billings was born on April 9, 1908, the second son of Thurman Arthur Billings and Virginia Gertrude "Gertie" Craig. His birth certificate lists his place of birth as Atoka, Tennessee. Atoka is a rural community in Tipton County that was established about 1873; its name being derived from the Muskogee Indian word meaning "the ball field". The current population of Atoka is only 659 and in 1908, no doubt was even smaller. Clyde's father Thurman, was also born in Tipton County, Tennessee and was a farmer just as his father, William David Billings, had been before him. Clyde Nolen was the third generation of Billings' to be born in Tipton County; before that his Great Grandfather, George W. Billings, was born in North Carolina, and migrated to Tennessee circa 1848-51. Clyde's Great Great Grandfather, Frederick Billings, was born in 1765 in North Carolina and as he is the son of a gentleman by the name of Johannes Siegfried Billings. There are two well known lines of Billings' in America, one English in origin and one German. Clyde's wife, Ethelene Freeze believed that her husband was of English descent; however, the author of this biography feels that with a name like "Johannes Siegfried" that the odds favor the German line over the English. Even though Clyde was born in a small rural farming community he was born in an age that was rapidly changing. The year he was born saw Henry Ford's Model T automobile come off the production line at a cost of only $850; no doubt a lot of money then....but still within reach of most Americans. With the advent of the affordable automobile came mobility and suddenly Clyde's "rural" community wasn't so far away from everything. As a youngster, Clyde would have listened to the radio, by no means a new invention, but it was "coming into its own" at the time he was growing up and National Radio programs were launched giving newscasts, sports scores, and music. By the time he is 12 the county goes "dry" and prohibition begins and with prohibition comes opportunity (for gangsters, that is)! Names like Al Capone and Lucky Luciano would have been very familiar to Clyde and I'm sure he must have listened to Radio reports of gangland murders in Chicago where rival gangs dueled over territory with the newly invented "tommy gun". Jazz was born while he was a teen and while it originally was played in the "speakeasies" and "saloons" which sprang up everywhere during prohibition, it eventually became mainstream and was played on the radio along with other music such as the ballads of Al Jolson and "crooner" tunes performed by musicians like Guy Lombardo. The first movies Clyde would have gone to would have been silent where he would have seen such greats as Douglas Fairbanks, Mary Pickford and Charlie Chaplain. By the time he is an adult the movies would have made the switch to "talkies". Clyde's world was changing rapidly and things changed for him as well; having been born a farmer's son, in times past he would have followed tradition and farmed like his father before him....but it was a new age and sons did not always follow in their father's footsteps, as indeed Clyde did not. In fact, he left the small rural community he grew up in and headed for the big city to further his education. Clyde moved to Memphis, Tennessee and began attending Southwestern Presbyterian University. When he made the move to Memphis, he stayed at a boarding house run by his Aunt Carrie. It is at this boarding house run by his Aunt that he first meets and falls in love with his future bride to be, Ethelene Freeze.
Clyde and Ethelene are married on 25 May 1929 in Hernando, Mississippi by the Reverend W. T. Glenn and
twelve months later their first child, Clyde Nolen, Jr. is born. Their
next son, William David Billings is born 07 Apr 1932 while they are living at 127 East Mallory in Memphis.
Unfortunately, William David, who has been named for Clyde's paternal grandfather, becomes gravely ill and
dies of meningitis and pneumonia at the age of 17 months on 19 Sep 1933. Two years later, Clyde and Ethelene are
blessed with twins, Bobby Dan and Marian Ann. Their next child was a long
time in coming but at last, Sara Frances
was born. Marian Ann (known just as "Ann") was delighted to have a sister at last, and at age 12 doted on little
Sara, treating her as her own "real" doll baby. It wasn't too long before Ann had another "real" doll baby to add to
her collection, for another sister, Susan Carol, born two years later completed the Billings family. When Ann was 3 years old she remembers having pneumonia and at the time of her illness the family was living on Cummings Street. Sometime after this illness, the family moved to Parkway where her father ran a Texaco Gas Station located at the corner of Bellevue and Parkway in partnership with a gentleman by the name of W. W. Smith. Ann remembers the name of the mechanic who worked at the station as being Grabazinsky. The family later ran a Sinclair Gas Station located at the corner of Walker and Bellevue. Because of the gas rationing that went on during WWII, Clyde believed that they were no longer going to be able to keep the gas station running and consequently took a job with the Frisco Railroad around 1942. He worked as a fireman and earned a salary of around $260 per month. Records indicate that in December of 1942, the family had moved into their home at 1315 S. Bellevue, where they remained until all of their children were grown. As the war wound on, Ann remembers that her father believed that there was a possibility that he would be drafted. Clyde therefore, enrolled in a school that had something to do with airplane construction/repair, so that he might have a skill that would enable him to help the war effort without having to leave home. It turned out to be a false alarm however, as he never was drafted. Sometime after the war's end (around 1946-47) Clyde began working for the Reed Brother's Dairy (later Klink's Dairy). He was a route salesman for the Tipton/Covington/Munford area where he grew up. It was while working for Reed Brother's Dairy that he was asked by a friend and fellow employee to join the newly formed Sartin Trucking Company as a Manager. The Sartin Trucking Company was later purchased by the Mason Dixon Trucking Company and Clyde worked for Mason Dixon as the Operations Manager until his retirement. Both of his sons, Clyde Nolen, Jr. and Bobby Dan worked for him as truck drivers. In 1967 when their youngest child, Susan was 19 years of age, Clyde and Ethelene purchased a new home in Parkway Village. Clyde retired and soon had added a workshop to the back of the home, where he indulged his love of woodworking. He made many beautiful pieces of furniture; one I particularly remember being a long window seat/sewing chest. He cleverly fashioned this chest from beautiful old panelled doors and Ethelene used it to store her many yards of fabrics. He also fashioned two smaller chests (exact duplicates of the larger chest) and presented one to me and one to my cousin Dana Billings. We were just teenagers at the time and while I'm not sure about Dana, I always thought of it as my "hope chest", a repository for household linens, etc., which I would someday use to set up housekeeping whenever my "Prince Charming" should come along and sweep me off my feet! Clyde lived a long and productive life in an era that was changing rapidly. His life spanned the introduction of the automobile, long distance airplane flights, and television. He witnessed the birth of Jazz and big band music and lived until 1981 when MTV launched the first music videos. He lived through WWII and watched women who had never worked outside their homes, begin to enter the work force...and eventually witnessed Sandra Day O'Connor become the first woman to sit on the U.S. Supreme Court. How did living in this era of rapid change affect my grandfather? What was his personal philosophy of life and how did he deal with so much upheaval and change? While I don't profess to know all that was in his heart and mind I do know this; he often repeated to his daughter, Ann, a quote from Shakespeare's Hamlet that for her always summed up the kind of man he was and it was this: "To thine own self be true and
it must follow, as the night the day, Notes:
Son of William David Billings and M. L. Barnes. |
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