Meet Your Neighbor: Glenn Wilson

Published 7:10 pm Sunday, May 29, 2011

Glenn Wilson spent Tuesday night doing something he never got around to 57 years ago.

He participated in commencement exercises at Ashville High School and received his diploma.

Wilson was a senior in Ashville’s class of 1954, set to graduate that May, but he enlisted in the Army in February to serve in the Korean War.  He retired from the military in 1974 and learned last summer that a provision now exists allowing veterans who left school to serve in Korea or Vietnam during wartimes to apply to local school superintendents for high school diplomas.

St. Clair Superintendent Jenny Seals and Gina Wilson, the school system’s curriculum coordinator, handled the arrangements for Wilson, and Principal Dr. Jason Baker presented him with his diploma.

“I couldn’t put a price on it,” the 75-year-old Shoal Creek resident said.  “This means I completed something I started a long time ago.  It’s one of the things on my list that I wanted to complete.”

Wilson’s persistence has served him well through two wars, quintuple bypass surgery, a violent attempt on his life, and a close encounter with a killer tornado last month.  As much as anything else, he’s a survivor.

Acknowledging that it’s been “a long road from 1954 when I left school until now,” Wilson was modest about his inclusion in Ashville High’s graduation program.  “I don’t want to take anything away from what you’ve accomplished,” he told members of this year’s senior class. “I just appreciate the opportunity to join you.”

After commencement rehearsal at Gadsden State Community College Tuesday morning, Wilson reminisced about the old days at Ashville High, his life during and after military service, and weathering last month’s deadly storms.

High school, then and now:  “The numbers are the big difference. There were 26 seniors in my class. Now I believe there are 82 this year. And, of course, the activities they have today are a lot greater.  At the time I was going, there was just basketball.  Walter Holt was the basketball coach, and I believe Jerry Gibbs brought the first football team when class started in ’53.”

Army Strong and Aiming High:  Wilson joined the Army on Feb. 24, 1954, and was deployed to Korea upon completing basic training. After completing his enlistment in 1956, he joined the Air Force the following year, retiring on October 1, 1974.  He spent 1967 and 1968 in Vietnam during the war.

Military assignments:  Most of Wilson’s work in the service involved clerical duties.  “That’s just because of what I’d learned in high school. I took shorthand and typing under Ruth Pope.”

“He’s still a pretty good typist,” his wife Bertha said.

“On a manual typewriter,” Wilson qualified. “I’ve still got one. It survived the tornado.”

Does he recommend military service for young people?  “I certainly would, and not just because I’m retired from the military.  With the situation the way it is today, if a young person, male or female, can’t go to college, the service is the place to go. When they complete one enlistment, they’ve got enough credits to go to college through the GI Bill.”

About education: “It’s one of the most worthy things in life for anyone.  Everything you can learn in school will better prepare you for life, even if you don’t understand why you have to learn it. It will enhance your knowledge and help you every time you take a test, whether it’s in school, for a driver’s license, or qualifying for a job.”

Returning to civilian life: The Wilsons settled in Center Point when he retired from the Air Force in 1974, later relocating to Shoal Creek. He started a roofing business before beginning a career in law enforcement and corrections that lasted almost 28 years.  

A life-threatening situation: Wilson worked for several years as a part-time inmate transport officer for the county sheriff’s department.  “I’d transported close to 2,000 inmates from jails to prisons and back for court dates, and I never had a problem.”  Then in May of 2005 an inmate “tried his best to kill me” while in transit to a circuit court appearance. The offender was later killed in Montgomery.  

“I still have problems with that at times,” Wilson said. “I hate that the guy was killed.” After a pause, he added, “The experiences I’ve had are nothing compared to what Bertha and I went through on the 27th of April.”

The tornado: It destroyed the Shoal Creek waterfront home they’d lived in since 1986. “It picked up the house, separated it, and set it back down.  We were in the basement, holding one another.  That’s all we could do. We were looking up, and I knew at that time we were at Heaven’s gate. But it wasn’t our time. The Good Lord said, ‘We don’t need you right now.’ And I’m thankful. One thing about all this is I’m here for a purpose.  One day I’ll find out what it is.”

Recovering: The Wilsons are staying in Rainbow City while making plans to rebuild their home. Their pets survived the storm, as did their vehicles, which were inside a detached garage that was blown away.  “The two cars were scratched up, but they were sitting there as proud as they could be.  We still don’t know what happened to our pontoon boat.”

“We have a reward out for it,” Mrs. Wilson said with a smile.  “If anyone finds our pontoon boat, they can keep it.”