Biographies of Lee County, Alabama

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Lee County
Alabama
Biographies

BRUCE, WILLIAM HERSCHEL
Born 18 Apr 1856 Troup, GA
Died Opelika, Lee Co, AL

William Herschel Bruce, college president and mathematician, son of Hilery S. and Catherine (Pruitt) Bruce, was born in Troup County, Georgia, on April 8, 1856. He spent most of his childhood in Alabama, where the family moved in 1861. After graduating from high school, Bruce, at the age of nineteen, began his teaching career in a rural school in Alabama. For the next eight years he taught school and attended Alabama A&M College (now Auburn University), where he graduated in 1883 with a B.A. in mathematics. That year he moved to Milltown, Georgia, where he continued to teach and began work on a Ph.D. at Mercer University in nearby Macon. The following year he accepted the position of head of the faculty of Blanco High School in Texas, where, in addition to his teaching and administrative duties, he practiced law. He continued to work on his Ph.D. and became Mercer University's first doctoral graduate in 1890.
During Bruce's nine years in Blanco, his reputation as a teacher and administrator attracted requests from eight school districts inviting him to be their superintendent. In 1893, over the objections of students and residents of Blanco, he accepted the position of superintendent in Marble Falls. He was so popular in Blanco that a number of the high school faculty and many students followed Bruce to his new post. He succeeded in gaining accreditation for the Marble Falls schools, as he had at Blanco. Three years later he did the same for Athens. In 1899 Athens residents financed a private school, which they named Bruce Academy in his honor. In 1899 Bruce left Athens to become president of the newly organized John Tarleton College (now Tarleton State University) in Stephenville, but he resigned in late 1900 because the college trustees refused to grant him a long-term contract.
Bruce returned to Athens for the 1900-01 school year, then accepted an invitation from North Texas State Normal College (now the University of North Texas) to become head of the mathematics department. From 1901 to 1905 he worked in this capacity and, beginning in 1902 or 1903, served as President Joel S. Kendall's primary assistant. Following Kendall's death in 1905, Bruce, in October 1906, became president of the small, sixteen-year-old school. For the next seventeen years he devoted his energy to establishing North Texas State as the leading teacher-training institution in Texas. By raising admission standards to meet the requirements established by major colleges, increasing the number of faculty members who held graduate degrees, and enlarging course offerings, he had, by 1916, changed North Texas State from a three-year preparatory school to a four-year college. By 1923 the Association of Texas Colleges and Universities and the American Association of Teachers Colleges had admitted North Texas State as a member. Student enrollment increased during Bruce's presidency from 1,028 to 4,700, while the number of faculty members grew from fourteen to 118. The size of the campus also grew, from ten to twenty-five acres; and eight new buildings, including the school's first dormitory, were added. As a result of these achievements, Bruce was able to persuade Governor Pat Neff and the state legislature to change the name of the institution to North Texas State Teachers College.

In 1905 Bruce served as president of the Texas State Teachers Association,qv and from 1912 to 1923 he was president of the Council of Texas Normal College Presidents. He also served as chairman of the Texas State Board of Examiners from 1905 to 1910. As a result of his first publication, Some Noteworthy Properties of a Triangle and Its Circles (1904), he was included in Men of Science in 1906. He also coauthored the textbooks Elements of Plane Geometry and Elements of Solid Geometry in 1910. In 1916 he published Principles and Processes of Education for summer-school use. In 1932 The Nine Circles of the Triangle received considerable notice from fellow mathematicians. Bruce also published two collections of poetry, The Charms of Solitude and Emergent Man, in the mid-1920s.

He and Lillie Ora Hart were married in 1879 and had three sons and one daughter. Bruce and his wife were leaders in community affairs and in the Denton Baptist Church until Mrs. Bruce was paralyzed by a stroke in 1923. As a result, on May 28 of that year, Bruce retired from the presidency of North Texas State and was made president emeritus. For the next fourteen years he divided his residence between Denton and Opelika, Alabama, where his wife lived in a clinic run by their son and daughter. After his wife's death in 1937, Bruce returned to Denton. He died on December 30, 1943, while visiting his children in Opelika, where he was interred.
Source: From the Handbook of Texas Online at the University of Texas at Austin; Submitted by Christine Walters
CHAMBERS, WILLIAM HENRY, lawyer, was born October 17, 1826, at Eatonton, Putnam County. Ga., and died July 6. 1881, at Auburn. Ala.; son of James McCoy and Martha Jones (Alexander) Chambers, the former also a native of Putnam County, Ga., who lived at Eatonton until 1839, and then removed to Columbus, Ga. The father was a man of broad learning, high culture, strikingly handsome in person and filled positions of great usefulnens in the state. In society and in the church. For many years he was asociate editor of the Soil of the South, a loading agricultural journal, and before the War of Secession was a constant contributor to Harper's Magazine and other leading periodicals. He was a son of Henry and Mary Chambers, the former migrating from Virginia to Georgia about the time of the Revolutionary war. His ancestors came from England and were immediately related to the distinguished family to which Sir William and Sir Robert Chambers, conspicuous in political and literary history of England, belong. The town of Chambersburg, Pa., was settled by three brothers, one of whom later went to Virginia and from that brother the Georgia and Alabama Chambers families are descended. William Henry Chambers' maternal grandparents were William and Elizabeth Alexander, who lived in Putnam County, Ga., and for many years before their deaths in Russell County, Ala. The Alexander ancestors came from Ireland some years before the Revolutionary war and were recipients of magnificent royal favors in Virginia grants or land. The city of Alexandria, Va., received its name from that family.
William Henry Chambers received his early education in the common schools of Eatonton, Ga., and the Manual Labor School at Covington, Ga. He was graduated at Emory College. Oxford, Ga., In 1845. receiving the A. B. degree and taking first honors in his class; later he attended the Law School of Harvard University, Cambridge, Mass., graduating there with distinction in 1847. He Immediately began the practice of law in Columbus, Ga.. and rapidly rose to a high position in his profession. In 1854 he removed to Eufaula, Barbour County, Ala., and became associated in practice with Gov. John Eli Shorter and Col. Eli Shorter, under the firm name of Shorter, Chambers & Shorter, which had a large and lucrative practice until the War of Secession called them into different fields of service of the Confederate government. After only a few years' residence in Barbour County he was elected to the state legislature, serving in 1859 and 1863. He was a life long Democrat and always active in promoting the party's welfare. After the War of Secession, upon retiring to his plantation in Russell County, he was elected to the state senate from the district then composed of Russell and Lee Counties. At the first call for volunteers he raised a company, "The Pioneer Guards," of which he was commissioned captain, at Eufaula, and promptly left for the front. Due to the loss of an eye he had to retire from the active service. He was a Mason; an Odd Fellow; and a member of the Methodist Episcopal church, South; always identified with its movements, serving in the capacity of steward, trustee and Sunday school superintendent and many times a delegate to annual and general conferences.

Mr. Chambers was one of the most polished scholars of his day in the state. While not the author of books, he was a constant contributor to papers and periodicals. During the first three years of his practice In Columbus, Ga., he was editor of The Sun, an aggressive Democratic paper in the midst of a Whig constituency. For several years during his residence in Eufaula, Ala., he was editorial contributor to the Eufaula Times, and for many years while residing on his estate in Russell County was editor in chief of the Southern Cultivator, published in Montgomery County. For the last few years of his life he was professor of English literature and agriculture in the Alabama polytechnic institute at Auburn. He was a safe, conservative, conscientious counselor, an orator of force and eloquence, a lawyer of conspicuous ability and success at the bar, an earnest and ever active Christian, a gentleman of the highest refinement. In all the domestic and family relationships a perfect type, a man without guile. Married: May 19, 1847, to Anne Lane Flewellen, a daughter of Dr. Abner Holloway Flewellen, who was of Welsh parentage and lived in Columbus, Ga., was a well educated man of broad culture and attained a high position in his profession. Children: 1. James Henry, of Atlanta, Ga., m. Mary Flournoy Abercromble; 2. William Lea, of Washington, D. C, m. Laura Ligon Clopton; 3. Porter Flewellen, of New York city, m. Alice Ely; 4. Martha Alexander, of Atlanta, Ga.. m. William Henry Alexander; 5. Robert Jones, of Montgomery, Ala., m. Ella Peet; 6. John Barbour, of St. Louis, Mo., m. Byrd Baker. Last residence: Auburn, Ala.
Source: History of Alabama and Dictionary of Alabama Biography, By Thomas McAdory Owen, Marie Bankhead Owen, Published by The S. J. Clarke publishing company, 1921; Transcribed by C. Anthony
LAMAR, WILLIAM HARMONG, Jr., lawyer and solicitor of the post office department, was born at Auburn, December 11, 1859; son of Dr. William Harmong and Ann M. (Glenn) Lamar (q. v.). He graduated from the Alabama polytechnic institute, A. B., 1881; Georgetown university, LL. B. 1884, and LL. M., 1885; began the practice of law at Washington, D. C., and Rockville, Md., 1885; was a member of the Maryland house of representatives, 1894; first lieutenant, Co. K, First Maryland volunteer infantry, later captain, U. S. volunteer signal corps, Spanish-American war, and saw service as signal officer under Maj. Gen. Jas. H. Wilson, in Porto Rico campaign; was brevetted major, 1899; assistant attorney, U. S. department of justice, 1906-13; assistant attorney general, now solicitor, of the post office department since May 1, 1913. He is a Democrat; a Methodist; and a member of the Alpha Tau Omega and Phi Delta Phi fraternities. Married: June 21, 1887, to Virginia Longstreet, daughter of Justice L. Q. C. and Virginia L. (Longstreet) Lamar, of the U. S. Supreme court, of Oxford, Miss., and Washington, D. C. Children: 1. Virginia Longstreet; 2. Augusta Glenn: 3. L. Q. C.; 4. William Harmong, Jr. Residence: Rockville, Md.
Source: History of Alabama and Dictionary of Alabama Biography, By Thomas McAdory Owen, Marie Bankhead Owen, Published by The S. J. Clarke publishing company, 1921; Submitted by Barb Ziegenmeyer

LAMAR WILLIAM HARMONG, physician, was born at Augusta, Ga., July 13, 1827, and died at Jasper; son of Col. Harmong and Martha Ann (Young) Lamar, the former a member of the Georgia State militia, and later a resident of Glenville, Barbour County; grandson of John Lamar, planter and slave owner of Georgia, and his wife, who was a Miss Apling, and of William Young, of Baltimore, Md., and Augusta, Ga.; and the sixth in descent from Thomas Lamar, Sr.., an early French emigrant to Virginia who was naturalized in Maryland. He attended the academy at Apling, Ga., Emory college, Oxford, and graduated from the Southern botanical medical college at Macon, Ga, He began the practice at Auburn in 1854, where he remained until 1895, when he removed to Jasper. Although unable to serve in the C. S. Army, he employed a substitute and several times visited the firing line himself. He was a Democrat; and a Methodist. He was the author of a book of poems and was the contributor of many articles to the state press. Married: January 7, 1847, at Glenville, to Ann Maria, daughter of Rev. John Bowles and Maria (Allen) Glenn (q. v.). Children: 1. Theodore J., married Orlean Augusta Cleveland (q. v.) ; 2. Charles R., minister of the Texas and Alabama conferences, and now a resident of Montgomery, m. Laura Cain; 3. Glennie C., m. T. S. Phillips; 4. William Harmong, m. Virginia Longstreet Lamar (q. v.) ; 5. Howard, lawyer, graduated from the Alabama polytechnic institute, A. B. 1882, A. M. (honorary), 1887; is a Democrat; admitted to the bar, 1889, and has since practiced at Jasper, m. Alma Hayes; 6. Annie, unm. ; 7. George Holt, m. Edith Stonestreet, and lives in Rockville. Last residence: Jasper.
Source: History of Alabama and Dictionary of Alabama Biography, By Thomas McAdory Owen, Marie Bankhead Owen, Published by The S. J. Clarke publishing company, 1921; Submitted by Barb Ziegenmeyer

LLOYD, EDWARD READ, teacher and director experiment station, was born March 10, 1867, at Auburn, Lee County; son of William Edward Lloyd of that place. He was educated in the public schools and graduated from the Alabama polytechnic institute with the degrees of B. S., in 1887, and M. S., in 1888. He attended the Graduate school, Columbus, Ohio, and Ames, Iowa, and took a course in agriculture at the University of Wisconsin. In 1888 he became assistant agriculturist of the Experiment station, Mississippi agricultural and mechanical college; was made agriculturist in 1890; vice-director in 1895; professor of agriculture, 1900; in 1906 was elected director of the Farmers institutes; and in 1910 was made director of the Experiment station. He is a Democrat and a Baptist. Married: December 18. 1890, at Starkeville, Miss., to Fannie Abert, daughter of Henry Arthur and Mary Delia (Bil- lington) Bell of that place. Children: 1. Edward Read, jr.; 2. Lani. Residence: Agricultural College, Miss.
Source: History of Alabama and Dictionary of Alabama Biography, By Thomas McAdory Owen, Marie Bankhead Owen, Published by The S. J. Clarke publishing company, 1921; Submitted by Barb Ziegenmeyer