U.S., Social Security Death Index, 1935-2014
Rosa Martin
HOPKINS — Services for Mrs. Rosa Lee Woodard Martin, 84, will be held 12 Noon Thursday (viewing at 11 a.m.) in the St. John Baptist Church, Hopkins, with burial in the church’s cemetery. Wake services will be held 7 p.m. this evening at the Leevy’s Funeral Home, Lower Richland Chapel. Surviving are her daughters, Luella and Rosa Mae; son, Reuben, Jr.; brothers, Rufus, Nathaniel, Robert, and Calvin; sisters, Julia, Cleo, and Mary; 9 grandchildren; 5 great grandchildren.
Catherine Leavel
GREENSBORO, N.C. — Mrs. Catherine McMillian Leavel, 80, passed home to heaven on Tuesday, December 28, 2004, in Moses Cone Hospital.
A graveside service will be held at 10:00 a.m. on Friday, December 31, 2004, in Guilford Memorial Park with Reverend Mark Putnam and Reverend David Bowden officiating. A memorial service will follow at 11:00 a.m. at Trinity Evangelical Covenant.
Mrs. Leavel was born July 30, 1924, in Rockingham Co., the daughter of William Lucas and Annie Meadows of Pelham, NC. She was the devoted wife of William Leavel of Greensboro, NC, and a charter member of Trinity Evangelical Covenant.
She is survived by her husband, William Leavel of Greensboro; daughters, Kay Leavel Miller and husband Larry of Leesburg, FL, Lisa Leavel Eifert of Columbia, SC; one grandchild, Bryan P. Martin; three step-grandchildren, Brian Miller, Christopher Miller, and Christopher Eifert; and one great-grandchild, Cameron Miller.
The family will receive friends 6-8 p.m. on Thursday at Hanes-Lineberry, N. Elm St. Chapel.
Memorial contributions may be sent to the American Leprosy Mission, 1 Alm Way, Greenville, SC, 29601; Columbia International University, 7435 Monticello Rd., P.O. Box 3122, Columbia , SC 29230; and Trinity Evangelical Covenant, 5200, W. Friendly Ave., Greensboro, NC 27410.
Ruth Padgett
BAMBERG — Mrs. Ruth Folk Padgett, 91, of 4611 Colston Road, Bamberg, died Tuesday, December 28, 2004, in The Regional Medical Center of Orangeburg.
Funeral services will be held three o’clock Thursday, December 30, 2004, in The Brice W. Herndon and Sons Funeral Homes, Ehrhardt-Bamberg Chapel. Burial will follow in Pleasant Hill United Methodist Church Cemetery.
Mrs. Padgett was born July 14, 1913, in Colleton County, and was a daughter of the late Lee Folk and Autrey Lillian Sandifer Folk. She was the widow of Leroy Padgett. She was a member of Colston Branch Baptist Church, where she was a member of the Young at Hearts Sunday School Class and the WMU. She was a former employee of Sunbeam. She will always be remembered for her love of taking care of her grandchildren and great-grandchildren.
Surviving are: her children, Norma Ruth Antley Hawkins and her husband Paul of Charleston, Lataine Hughes and her husband Charles, Sr. of Bamberg, and Mamie Lee Curry of Charleston; her grandchildren, Charles Edward Hughes, Jr. and his wife Jan of Bamberg, Brenda H. Nipper and her husband Larry of Bamberg, Steven Antley and his wife Bonnie of Charleston, and Elizabeth Lee Duckworth and her husband Jim of Charleston; her great-grandchildren, Elizabeth Lee Nipper Bunch and her husband Marshall of Bamberg, Jessica Renee’ Nipper of Spartanburg, Larry Gordon Nipper of Bamberg, Christopher Edward Hughes of Bamberg, and Jillian Rebecka Hughes of Bamberg; her great-great grandson, John Marshall Bunch, II; and her sister, Grace Creech of Chaplin. She was preceded in death by a grandson, Ralph Curry, Jr.
Family and friends may call from 6 until 8 p.m. Wednesday at The Brice W. Herndon and Sons Funeral Home, Ehrhardt-Bamberg Chapel, 2515 Lowcountry Highway, Ehrhardt, 803.267.1971. At other times, the family will gather at the home of Mr. and Mrs. Larry Nipper, 7785 Broxton Bridge Road, Bamberg, SC, 803.245.4116.
Hal Williams
COLUMBIA — Hal Robinson Williams, of Columbia, died Tuesday, December 28, 2004. A memorial service will be held at 2:00 p.m. on Thursday, December 30, 2004, at Eastminster Presbyterian Church, Trenholm Road, Columbia. The family will be at home.
Mr. Williams, born March 14, 1928, in Spartanburg, South Carolina, was the son of the late Sara Lloyd Williams and Robert Fulton Williams. His family lived in Greer, South Carolina, where he attended the public schools. He first attended Presbyterian College and later graduated from Furman University with a degree in Economics. Mr. Williams served as an officer in the U.S. Navy. He worked for New York Life Insurance Company, and later came to Columbia with Provident Life and Accident Insurance Company in group sales. He later headed the group sales division of Palmetto State Life Insurance Company. He then opened The Hal R. Williams Agency and was an independent insurance broker throughout South Carolina for many years. He was a member of Eastminster Presbyterian Church and a charter member of Spring Valley Country Club, where he was an avid golfer and loved to play gin rummy with his many friends.
Mr. Williams is survived by his wife of 47 years, Jane Kerr Williams, formerly of Charlotte, NC; three daughters, Nancy Williams (Mrs. Jackson Mark) Heard, of Cumming, Georgia, Katherine Williams (Mrs. Simpson Zimmerman) Fant, of Columbia, and Lee DeArbry Williams, of Atlanta, Georgia; and seven grandchildren, Caroline Robinson Heard, Elizabeth Jane Heard, Mark Jackson Heard, all of Cumming, Georgia, and Katherine Powers Fant, Caroline Hunter Fant, Simpson Zimmerman Fant, Jr., and Hal Williams Fant, all of Columbia. He is also survived by two brothers, Thomas A. Williams of Greer, and James R. Williams of Greenville. He was predeceased by his older brother, Dr. Robert Fulton Williams, Jr., of Greer.
Memorials may be made to the American Cancer Society, Project Pet, or a charity of one’s choice.
The family wishes to give special thanks for the loving care given to Mr. Williams during his illness by his devoted caretakers Janie Gilmore, Frances Bacote, and Maedean Brown.
Janie Hutley
SUMTER — Services for Janie Smith Hutley, 95, widow of Charlie Hutley, will be held at 3 p.m. Thursday at Job’s Mortuary with burial in Smith Cemetery. Born in Sumter to Henry and Estelle Smoot Smith, she died Dec. 27, 2004. She was a member of First Baptist Missionary Church. Surviving are sons, Jimmy and Earl Hutley; eight grandchildren; 23 great-grandchildren; 15 great-great-grandchildren; special niece, Emma Furman.
DONALD L. HOLLOWELL
Acclaimed civil rights attorney
ATLANTA — During a long career at the center of historic events, attorney Donald L. Hollowell helped free the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. from prison and desegregate Atlanta’s public schools and the University of Georgia.
Regarded by many as the pre-eminent civil rights attorney in Georgia — and perhaps the South — the 87-year-old Hollowell died of heart failure Monday, said Stanley Foster, a partner at Hollowell, Foster & Gepp.
In the 1950s and ‘60s, Hollowell served as one of the lead lawyers in the desegregation of Atlanta schools. He represented King in 1960 after the civil rights leader was sent to Reidsville Prison on a DeKalb County traffic charge. He was attorney for Charlayne Hunter-Gault and Hamilton Holmes Jr. as they integrated UGA in 1961.
Hollowell’s firm worked to desegregate Augusta’s buses and Macon’s schools and won a landmark case requiring Atlanta’s Grady Memorial Hospital to admit black doctors and dentists to its staff.
Along the way, Hollowell mentored a host of young black lawyers, including Vernon Jordan and Horace Ward.
In1966, Hollowell accepted an appointment from President Johnson as the first regional director of the new Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, which monitors discrimination in the workplace.
He remained at the EEOC as regional attorney until 1985 and was considered a likely candidate for a federal or state judgeship, although no nomination ever came.
Jordan, who went on to become an adviser to Jimmy Carter and Bill Clinton and to lead the National Urban League, said Hollowell was “a friend, mentor, boss, idol and role model.”
“He taught me how to be a lawyer, a leader, how to fight injustice. Whatever I have become in the years, I owe it to him in large measure,” said Jordan, now a managing partner of Lazard Freres & Co. in New York.
Hollowell was born in Wichita, Kan., on Dec. 19, 1917. He was told by his janitor father at age 18 to quit school to make ends meet.
He went straight to Fort Leavenworth and enlisted in the Army’s all-black 10th Cavalry, the regiment known as the Buffalo Soldiers in the Old West.
During his six years in the Army, he earned his high school diploma and, in 1941, enrolled in all-black Lane College in Jackson, Tenn., where he became starting quarterback on the football team.
After Pearl Harbor, Hollowell re-enlisted and rose to the rank of captain while serving in Europe. He returned to Lane after the war and earned an undergraduate degree. In 1951, he received his law degree from Loyola University.
Hollowell is survived by his wife, Louise.
“I am not sure we will ever see the likes of Hollowell again,” Jordan said Tuesday.
HANK GARLAND
Country, rock guitar virtuoso
ORANGE PARK, Fla. — Legendary country, rock and jazz guitarist Hank Garland, who performed with Elvis Presley, the Everly Brothers, Roy Orbison, Patsy Cline, Charlie Parker and many others, died of a staph infection Monday, his family said. He was 74.
In the 1950s and ’60s, Walter “Hank” Garland was the talk of Nashville, known for musical riffs that could take a recording from humdrum to dazzling, as he did on Elvis hits like “Little Sister” and “Big Hunk of Love.”
He had his first million-selling hit at 19 with “Sugar Foot Rag,” a famous country tune.
In addition to performing with Elvis and other stars in Nashville, Garland was at the forefront of the rock ‘n’ roll movement, enjoyed a career as a country virtuoso, pioneered the electric guitar at the Grand Ole Opry and inspired jazz instrumentalists such as George Benson. He jammed in New York City with jazz greats like Parker and George Shearing.
His session logbook reads like a “Who’s Who” of the stars of country music. It includes Brenda Lee, Mel Tillis, Marty Robbins, Boots Randolph, Conway Twitty and Hank Williams Sr.
