Singleton and Related Genealogy Pages
A history of many families.
1921 - 2008 (87 years)| Name | Clara Bell LEWIS [2, 3] | |
| Birth | 27 Jul 1921 | Manning, Clarendon County, South Carolina  [4] |
| Gender | Female | |
| HIST | Date Published: November 14, 2008 CLARA L. ELMORE Clara L. Elmore, 87, widow of I.D. Elmore, died Wednesday, Nov. 12, 2008, at Tuomey Regional Medical Center. Born in Manning, she was a daughter of the late Joseph Allen Lewis and the late Martha Holladay Lewis. Mrs. Elmore was a member of First Baptist Church. She was retired from Burns Florist and Flowers by Marsha Hanes. She was a charter member and past president of the Bland Garden Club of Sumter and was president of the State of S.C. Garden Club from 1973 to 1975. She also started the S.C. Highway Beautification Program. Survivors include nephews, Robby Elmore, Glenn Elmore, Brent Elmore, Gary Elmore and Deaver Kohl, all of Sumter; nieces, Pam Coffer of Columbia, Terri Elmore Holt of Gainesville, Fla., and Juanita Elmore Rella of Spanish Fort, Ala.; and a sister, Rosa Lewis Wilson of Winston-Salem, N.C. Graveside services will be held at 11 a.m. Saturday in the Sumter Cemetery with the Rev. Charles Clanton officiating. The family will receive friends from 4 to 6 p.m. today at Elmore-Cannon-Stephens Funeral Home. Memorials may be made to the Bland Garden Club, c/o Cris Satterthwaite, 965 Oakbrook Blvd., Sumter, SC 29150. Elmore-Cannon-Stephens Funeral Home and Crematorium of Sumter is in charge of the arrangements. Date Published: March 1, 2009 Sumter Volunteers adds 3 to distinguished list By IVY MOORE Item Features Editor ivym@theitem.com Today marks the beginning of National Women’s History Month, an occasion traditionally observed by Sumter Volunteers by adding outstanding local women to its Women’s Honor Roll of Sumter County. Through the years since 1993, 87 women and women’s organizations have been added to the roll. A special ceremony Wednesday afternoon will celebrate three more who have made outstanding contributions to Sumter County. Jo Anne Morris, executive director of Sumter Volunteers, announced the honorees last week. They are Gene Boyle Brading, Clara Lewis Elmore and Dr. Shirley Jean McFadden Palmer. A ceremony and reception in their honor will be held at 3 p.m. March 4 at the Swan Lake Visitors Center. It will be followed by the planting of Lady Banksia roses for each along the front fence of the Sumter Exhibition Center. The public is invited to attend both parts of the program, Morris said. Women’s History Month, now a nationwide observance, began as a modest weeklong observance in 1977. Women’s History Week was an educational project in the schools of Sonoma County, Calif. Four years later, Congress made National Women’s History Week official. When the recognition of women’s contributions to history grew even further, Congress expanded the celebration to a month, beginning in 1987. Sumter began observing the month under the auspices of the YWCA of the Upper Lowlands in 1981. It was in 1993 that Sumter Volunteers established The Women’s Honor Roll of Sumter County to honor women who have made outstanding contributions to its history. At the first ceremony, 20 women were honored posthumously and Lady Banksiae roses planted in their honor on the pergola in Volunteer Park. Since that time, 63 additional women and four women’s organizations have been honored and rosebushes for each of them have been planted on the Exhibition Center fence as “living monuments.” An exception was made in Sumter’s bicentennial year, 2000, when the roses were planted at Swan Lake-Iris Gardens in the special Bicentennial Salute to Women. For the first time that year, Sumter Volunteers included outstanding women’s organizations on the Honor Roll, along with two famous women from Sumter’s past, Natalie Delage Sumter (Mrs. Thomas Sumter Jr.) and Angelica Singleton Van Buren (President Martin Van Buren’s daughter-in-law). The recognition service was held at the Sumter Opera House for this special salute, which honored all the women and groups recognized up to that point. The ceremony returned to the Exhibition Center in 2001 with roses planted on the west fence. With the addition of this year’s honorees the honor roll now numbers 90. The Honor Roll plaque is permanently installed in the front lobby, upper level, of Patriot Hall. It will be on display at the Swan Lake Visitors Center following Wednesday’s program. Some of the women honored are now deceased; all others are invited to the ceremony, along with friends and family of past and present honorees. Today also marks 33 years of service to the Sumter community by Sumter Volunteers. The volunteer group was founded by The Junior Welfare League of Sumter on March 1, 1976. Here are this year’s Women of Honor: GENE BOYLE BRADING Gene Boyle Brading is deeply rooted in Sumter County — all the way back to 1890, when her grandfather, William Belton Boyle, settled here. The Boyle family has served the community since that time. Brading’s grandfather and father, Edwin Boyle, both served terms as mayor and were instrumental in the city’s industrial growth. She has continued her predecessors’ efforts. Brading has worked with Sumter County in the development of successful industrial parks and speculative buildings. After the 1979 death of her husband, Stan Brading, she took over operation of his real estate business, quickly rising from sales to become broker in charge. Gene Brading was honored by Gov. Mark Sanford in September 2008 as an Ambassador for Economic Development during the 18th annual Industry Appreciation Week for her work to further economic development in Sumter County. In 1982, Brading was selected as the state’s delegate to the White House Conference for the Aged, served on the fundraising committee for Covenant Place, constructed in 1994, and served on the executive committee for the financing and renovation of Tuomey Hospital, now Tuomey Regional Medical Center. A graduate of Duke University with a degree in sociology, she has also served that institution’s Women’s Alumnae Association, and she is a past president of the S.C. Women’s Gideon Bible Auxiliary and of the Sumter League of Women Voters. Brading is the mother of four — Barbara and Ed, both deceased; and Alice and Stan. As a 2009 inductee, she joins her mother, the late Alice Dickson Boyle, who was honored posthumously as a Woman of Honor of Sumter County in 1996. A strong promoter of gardening, The Alice Boyle Garden center honors her efforts. CLARA LEWIS ELMORE Clara Lewis Elmore is honored for her many accomplishments over her lifetime, July 27, 1921-Nov. 12, 2008. She spent her entire life enjoying the beauty of nature, gardening, birds, flower arranging and wildlife — the entire spectrum of the garden club. Born in Manning, Elmore moved to Sumter and married the late I.D. Elmore Jr. An avid gardener, Clara Elmore was a charter member of the Bland Garden Club, which was organized on Sept. 5, 1950, and federated on July 27, 1951. She served as president four times. Elmore was one of a group including Sara Brody and Edwin Boyle, who worked tirelessly to raise funds to build the Alice Boyle Garden Center on land given by the city in the 1960s and adjoining Swan Lake-Iris Gardens. The Council of Garden Clubs of Sumter erected the brick wall on the west side of the center in her honor. Elmore worked for the local YWCA, the Greater Sumter Chamber of Commerce and two florists — Burns Florist and Marsha Hanes. During her 58 years in gardening, Elmore also made her mark beyond her community. She served as West Sandhills District director and went on to become president of the Garden Club of South Carolina in 1973. During her two-year term she began a statewide project to beautify S.C. highways. For her contributions, Elmore was awarded life memberships in the Council of Garden Clubs of Sumter, the board of directors, Garden Club of S.C. and the National Garden Club. Participating in a national beautification project, the eight garden clubs of Sumter under Elmore’s direction began an outstanding local beautification program in the late 1960s, creating mini-parks throughout the community in celebration of the tricentennial of S.C. in 1970. This project won a national award. Her pet mini-park project was transforming the post office islands into garden spaces with bright plantings of celosia and other hardy annuals. Elmore could be seen night and day planting, watering and maintaining these spots of beauty. She was a great advocate for civic beautification. The mini-parks gave way to progress and change. The small triangle garden off Alice Drive and West Liberty Street at Kenilworth Street still bears a semblance of the original parks and is the only remaining site. Elmore thoroughly enjoyed all the projects of the local garden council. She planned and looked forward to the annual Holiday House Tour and Tea and the spring garden tours. In addition, she was a nationally accredited flower show judge, writing schedules for many shows and enjoying decades of award-winning exhibits. She always observed Arbor Day by planting trees; she enjoyed teaching and sharing her vast knowledge of flower arranging and gardening and was a mentor to many young gardening enthusiasts. Elmore’s home on Haynsworth Street was a showplace year-round and spoke volumes of her love and passion for gardening and creating beauty. She died in 2008, but she will long be remembered as the consummate gardener and an asset to her community. THE REV. DR. SHIRLEY JEAN MCFADDEN PALMER To everything there is a season and a time for every purpose under the heaven ... Ecclesiastes 3:1 Dr. Shirley Jean McFadden Palmer was a daughter, wife, mother, grandmother, church and community servant and a lover of God and people. She died on Sept. 12, 2008, ready to meet her savior after a long, full life. Born in New Zion on Jan. 8, 1938, she was the second of two children born to the late Robert G. McFadden and Annie Mae Montgomery McFadden. She was the stepdaughter of the late Charlie Goodman. Palmer was reared in the Shiloh community of Sumter County, attended St. John Rosenwald School from grades one to 10 and graduated from Lincoln High School Class of 1955. She earned a bachelor’s degree in elementary education from Morris College in 1959, a master’s degree in education from the University of South Carolina in Columbia; a master’s in religion from Lutheran Theological Southern Seminary in Columbia; and a doctorate in ministry from United Theological Seminary in Dayton, Ohio. She completed further studies at South Carolina State University in Orangeburg and Francis Marion University in Florence. Palmer was converted at an early age while attending St. John United Methodist Church and Asbury United Methodist Church in the Shiloh community of Lynchburg. She later joined Jehovah Missionary Baptist Church, where she served on the chancel choir, as deaconess and as an adviser to the youth fellowship. On May 3, 1958, she married Ellie W. Palmer, and the union was blessed with three children, Wanda Palmer Brown, Ronald Winfield Palmer and Ellie Winfield Palmer II. Rev. Palmer always had a will to do what was right not just for her family, but also for those with whom she worked and those in her community. She had a special love for her mother, providing nurture and care for her until her death. Palmer visited the sick and was a voice for all people encouraging love. Palmer served God in all that she did, putting him first. Her service to High Hills Baptist Church was widespread. She was an associate pastor, adviser and member of the Pastor’s Aide Ministry and the Senior Missionary Society; she also served as assistant reviewer for the church school lessons, assistant teacher for Bible Study, teacher for Vacation Bible School and a willing servant of the church and its ministries. An active community servant, Palmer was instrumental in the development of the Sumter County African American Cultural Center at 345D Manning Avenue in Sumter with a goal of developing a museum of pride, honor and character building that would tell the historical story of African Americans in Sumter and adjacent counties. Her work had just begun for Sumter City Council, as she went door to door to determine the needs of those in her district when she went on to be with the Lord. Palmer began her professional career in Sumter School District 2, where she was a classroom teacher at Delaine Elementary School. She served as a reading teacher before becoming the reading coordinator for the district. She retired after more than 30 years. Palmer’s favorite scripture was John 15:7 — If ye abide in me, and my words abide in you, ye shall ask what ye will, and it shall be done unto you. [2, 3] | |
| Occupation | she was retired from Burns Florist and Flowers by Marsha Hanes [2] | |
| Religion | she was a member of First Baptist Church, Sumter, South Carolina [2] | |
| _UID | 07E9AB21F32A4ACB87609E70AD9924479421 | |
| Death | 12 Nov 2008 | Tuomey Regional Medical Center, Sumter, Sumter County, South Carolina |
| Burial | 15 Nov 2008 | Sumter Cemetery, 700 W. Oakland Avenue, Sumter, Sumter County, South Carolina [2] |
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| Person ID | I102064 | Singleton and Related Families |
| Last Modified | 29 Oct 2020 | |
| Father | Joseph Allen LEWIS, b. 23 Jul 1875 d. 16 Jan 1925 (Age 49 years) | |
| Mother | Martha Anne “Mattie” HOLLADAY, b. 14 Nov 1876 d. 27 Apr 1925 (Age 48 years) | |
| Marriage | 2 Jun 1904 [5] | |
| _UID | 42D2CE4F6FA246FE8D3F0DB945CCCDFFF5A6 | |
| _UID | 42D2CE4F6FA246FE8D3F0DB945CCCDFFF5A6 | |
| Family ID | F42398 | Group Sheet | Family Chart |
| Family | Isaac Deaver ELMORE, Jr. d. Bef 24 Jun 2005 | |
| Marriage | 9 Jan 1945 [4] | |
| _UID | 07B20CF51385469FB9EB11686DEFC456CAE7 | |
| _UID | 07B20CF51385469FB9EB11686DEFC456CAE7 | |
| Family ID | F70653 | Group Sheet | Family Chart |
| Last Modified | 5 Jun 2004 | |
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