Walking Down Memory Lane

By William T. Gillion, Sr

This book is published to share information about myself and my family. In my early days, we were a moving family. At one time we moved every three months, when that time was up, you needed to be ready to move because we were going somewhere. After we were all adults, we would get together for a family meal and talk about our many moves and Dad would say, "The bad thing about it is, that we missed a lot of good moves." You will learn that I started my business training at the early age of five. I have been connected with business all my life. You will learn about me meeting my beautiful wife, our children, the type of work I did, the businesses I owned, my devotion to God, my being an active part of my community, many of my investments, my retirement and what I am doing with my retirement. The books i am writing is to share the information I have learned,to help others not to make the same mistakes that I have made. If I can help someone else, then my life will be fulfilled. I heard about a man entering into a city that he had never been in and was looking for a friend. He saw a mature man sitting on a bench, and thought that he could help him to find the person he was looking for. He asked the man if he had been living in this town all of his life and his answer was, "Well, not yet." Who knows, I may be able to say that and be able to add to my book later in life. Please enjoy my book and look at my other books..

• Language: English
• Publisher: William T. Gillion, Sr
• Release date: Dec 6, 2017
• ISBN: 9781370534845

William T. Gillion, Sr

William T Gillion, Sr. is semi-retired and has owned several businesses and has sold most of them for retirement. I wanted to share information gained through my businesses. This book will help anyone that wants to improve their life style.Why should you stay stuck in a low income when you can choose the life style you want for you and your family. Read this book to understand what you can do to live better and have the income you need to provide a better life for your family. The choice is yours. Only you control your future. No one can hold you back if you are willing to do what it takes.

Book preview

Walking Down Memory Lane

Copyright 2017 William T Gillion, Sr.

Published by William Gillion at Smashwords

Thank you for downloading this ebook. This book remains the copyrighted property of the author, and may not be redistributed to others for commercial purposes. If you enjoyed this book, please encourage your friends to download their own copy from their favorite retailer. Thank you for your support.

This publication is designed to provide accurate and authoritative information in regard to the subject matter covered. It is sold with the understanding that the writer is not engaged in rendering professional services. If professional advice or other expert assistance is required, the services of a competent professional person should be sought.

Table of Contents

Prologue

Chapter 1 - We Were a Moving Family

Chapter 2 - My First Job

Chapter 3 - I Joined the Army National Guard

Chapter 4 - I Met the Love of My Life - And Married Her

Chapter 5 - Moving Again

Chapter 6 - My Time as a Radio Announcer

Chapter 7 - A New Job in Abbeville, SC

Chapter 8 - Pastor First Church in Hartsville, SC

Chapter 9 - Saluda, SC our Last Move

Chapter 10 - Television Sales Service and Shop Owner

Chapter 11 - Insurance Broker and Office Owner

Chapter 12 - Royal Rangers

Chapter 13 - My Son Joined the Army National Guard

Chapter 14 - Licensed Real Estate Office Owner and Broker-in-Charge

Chapter 15 - The Day the Church Choir Stopped Singing

About the Author

Connect with Me

Prologue

Walking Down Memory Lane

By: William T Gillion, Sr.

I was born to the Johnnie William Gillion, Jr. and Nettie Leopard family.

I was the baby in a family of five (5) children. There were four (4) Males and one (Female). Their names in order were: James Wiley, Johnnie Edward, Curtis Eugene, Betty Lee and William Thomas (Billy) Gillion, Sr. My three older brothers were born in Saluda County, SC and my sister was born in Greenwood County, SC.

I always joked with my family that they were ashamed of me so they moved to Chester long enough for me to be born. My Father was out of work and found a job in Chester and my family move to be close to the job.

Just after I was born, my Aunt Estelle Butler came to see the new baby and went back home and told my grandmother (Granny Betty) Betty Leopard Griffith that the new baby was the ugliest child she had ever seen.

I had several of the childhood diseases that most children have, but mine came all at the same time.

In my early childhood days we were a family that moved many times for several reasons. I remember that at one time we would move every three months. At the end of three months you knew to go ahead and pack because we were about to move some where. Later in life we would talk about all our moves and Dad would speak up and say, The funny thing about all of our moves was that we missed a lot of good moves".

My memory is not clear about our moves from birth to around 5 years old, but, around 5 years old I remember moving to Greenwood County, SC.

Chapter1 We Were A Moving Family

Pine Grove School

I remember that we moved across the road from Pine Grove School at Blakedale, Greenwood County, SC. I was too young to go to school at that time and many times my mother and dad would be gone and at lunch time I would go across the road to the school house and they would allow me to go into the lunch room and eat lunch with them.

We would make most of our toys such as rolling tires, kicking tin cans until we were caught kicking the can with our shoes on and when we kicked them bare footed it would make our feet sore and many of our toys were made of wood. We would take scrap one by four lumber and make many things out of it. We would go down into the woods and climb small hard wood trees and swing them back and forth and had much fun. One day some friends of ours came over to play with us and we went down into a pine thicket and our friends climbed the pine trees and started swinging them. The pine trees would break if you bent them to much while swinging. We had made some toy pistols out of the scrap lumber and my brother told one of our friends that he would shoot him out of the tree if he did not come down. Our friend said, Go ahead and start shooting. and about that time my brother pointed the toy pistol at him and he said, bang, and the top broke out of the tree and he fell to the ground as if he had really been shot.

While we were living there my brother and I were playing a game and my brother lay on his back with his feet up in the air and I sat down on his feet. When he propelled me through the air, I fell on my arm and broke both bones in my right arm. The memory of the broken bones has stayed with me all these years.

Bishopville Farm

I remember at the age of five, we moved to Bishopville, SC and leased a farm to do share cropping. When the crops were harvested, we would take the wagon and load it with crops we raised and on one special day we had water melons on the wagon and we had the regular and we had green and white striped. I heard my father joking about the striped water melon and when a customer stopped to buy water melons, I told them what my father had said; I told them that the striped were mixed with water melon and citron. Boy, did I get in trouble over repeating the words of my father.

While we lived there, my brothers and I, at night, when my dad, mother and sister would go to town to do their shopping, would go down to the church grave yard with sheets on to greet the night shoppers at the country store next door and one night a boy was riding a bicycle and when we raised up and called to him, he threw the bicycle in the ditch and ran all the way home. I guess he thought he could run faster than he could peddle.

After we moved down there, my Uncle Henry Styron, the man that raised my father after my grandfather was killed by a tree that fell on him next to Good Hope Baptist Church in Saluda County, SC, moved close to us and we would go to the big lake close to where we lived and we would go to where the creek mouth was and Uncle Henry would get in the water to gravel for fish under the bank and when he found one, he would throw it up on the bank for us to put in the bag. I remember on one occasion we heard him say, Watch out boys, here comes a snake.

We had a saw mill close to our house and we would go down and get a strip of wood and go to the store and ask for a cigar box and put them together to make a guitar and use rubber bands or strings or anything else we thought would make a sound to make the strings for our guitar. We were always looking for new ideas. One day someone told use about a new cat gut that was being used as fishing line and other uses and thought that it might make good strings and that we should try it. We had no idea what this new cat gut was, so, my brothers heard that a neighbor of ours had some cats, so, we went down to visit and asked if she would give us a cat. We did not tell her why we wanted the cat and she did not ask us. I guess she was just glad to get rid of it. She said, You boys look like pretty good boys and if you will promise to take real good care of it, I will give you one. Well as soon as we reached home, we proceeded to secure our cat gut, but, I must tell you that it did not work, so, please, do not try the same idea we tried. We did not learn what cat gut was until several years later. We were very surprised to learn that it was a nick name for a monofilament plastic line.

Piedmont Street Extension

We moved back to Greenwood, SC on what was known as Piedmont Street Extension before it was renamed. We lived next door to a lady that worked with my mother that witnessed to her about the love of God and the forgiveness of sin. My mother started going to church with our neighbor and gave her heart to God. My father thought it was foolish and did not want any part of church.

During the time we lived at this location, the contractors were building houses on Bolt Street and we came up with a good plan to make money. I don't remember where we got the red wagon. Since we brought a wash tub from the farm, we took our wash tub and filled it with ice and soft drinks and candy, crackers and other snacks and pulled it over to Bolt Street at lunch time and sold our snacks to the workers. When that job ran out, we bought a snow ball cart and bought a block of ice and an ice scraper to fill the snow ball cups and several flavors of snow ball syrup and pushed the cart all over the mill village while we lived there. We were always able to create our own jobs.

I remember my Dad had a shot gun that the end of the barrel had split and Dad had the end of the barrel sawed off. One day my Dad decided to go hunting. He loved to hunt rabbits. I asked if I could go with him and he agreed. Back then he loved to smoke his pipe. We were going down a path and a rabbit jumped up and ran. My Dad had his pipe in his mouth at the time