Branch manager and head librarian Griffin Anderson accepts Joanna Padgett-Atkisson donation of her grandfather Andrew Festus Padgett’s WWI Army jacket to Moss Memorial Library.
By Griffin Anderson
Guest Writer
Moss Memorial Library was thrilled to accept a new addition to its collection. Joanna Padgett-Atkisson donated her grandfather Andrew Festus Padgett’s WWI Army jacket, which is now on permanent display in the library’s Mary Fonda Heritage Room special collection and archives of local history.
The Padgett family were some of the early settlers of Clay County, arriving here in the mid-1800s. Padgett was one of five — Herman, Andy, Edna, Beulah and Guy — children born to William Edgar and Cordie Coleman Padgett. He graduated Hayesville High School in 1918 and served in the U.S. Army until mustered out in 1919 at the end of WWI. He later attended Kings Business College in Tennessee, but returned home with his bride Eva and was employed as a rural mail carrier, serving the same route for 42 years.
For the first several years, he traversed his 20-mile route riding on a hardy mule. In the late 1920's he purchased his first automobile when the roads were mostly red clay mud in the winter and dusty hard in the summer.
Padgett later served as a county commissioner from 1966 to 1970 and was also very active in the Masonic Lodge, holding state-wide offices, was involved with the Masonic Orphanage and active with the Truett Baptist church, serving as deacon over many years. In addition to his employment as a mail carrier, he had a furniture store for a few years to help with college expenses for his family of four children — Myrt, Joe, Jerry and Cordia. He owned land on both sides of the Hiwassee River and turned part of this into a dairy farm on Myers Chapel Road from the 1940s to 1970.
After Padgett’s passing in 1986, his son Jerry placed his father’s WWI Army jacket in safe keeping. He often wondered what was to become of this treasured possession. Jerry's niece, Joanna Padgett-Atkisson, made inquiries around Hayesville to see where this historical object might find its final residence in the county where Padgett spent his lifetime and gave to his community. After discussion with Moss Memorial Library’s branch manager and head librarian Griffin Anderson, Padgett-Atkisson graciously donated the framed jacket to the library’s collection, along with a historic photograph. Anderson encourages anyone who is interested in Clay County or western North Carolina history to come visit the library’s special collection and archives and reminds the community that the library will always be happy to be caretakers of documents or items of local historical significance.