Professor Joseph Samuel Espy

This is my great-great-uncle, Joseph Samuel Espy.  He was a son of my paternal great-great-great-grandparents, Robert Marion Espy and Elizabeth (Watt) Espy.  He was a brother of my great-great grandfather, Thomas Franklin Espy.  

Robert Marion Espy's date of death should read 1958, and the Coolidge professor was Norman Flavius Coolidge, uncle of future US President Calvin Coolidge.

Again, Norman Flavius Coolidge

The Abbeville Herald

June 13, 1929

The Abbeville Herald

August 4, 2005

The Wiregrass Farmer

October 31, 1929

The Dothan Eagle

November 12, 1929

The Wiregrass Farmer

November 14, 1929

The Abbeville Herald

November 14, 1929

John J. Espy, Sr. and son Major Espy attended the funeral.  J.J. and Joseph were first cousins.

from Find A Grave

"In 1948, Uncle Joe's son Carl Espy (a multi-millionare living in Savannah, Georgia) did two things to honor the memory of his father.  In Abbeville (AL), he donated chimes for the First Baptist Church.  In Lawrenceville (AL), the Missionary Baptist Church, standing near where the Academy once stood, had closed in 1946.  The church was badly in need of extensive repairs.  Carl Espy paid for the expense of repairing and reopening the church."  - Jack Elliot, "The Lawrenceville Academy"

Here's a biography of H.H. Golson, whose son Billy accidentally ran over and killed Professor Espy.

And here's a mention of Professor Espy and the young Billy Golson in another article by Henry County historian, Larry Smith.

I'm putting this article way down here, because it seems to have a few big mistakes.   

The Abbeville Herald

May 13, 1926

It was an uncle of the future president - not grandfather.  His name was Norman Flavius Coolidge.  But the spelling of his name on the historic marker is Cooledge, which makes me question everything a bit more.  The whole first paragraph seems wrong.  Was his grandfather ever in the South?  An uncle was!