Biographies

BIOS

Gary Neal Glover James Lawson Campbell Col. Marter D. Middleton Virgil D. Cox Martha J. Blackstock



GARY NEAL GLOVER

Youth minister and friend to all dies at age 36

Christy L. Smith

Gary Neal Glover was a selfless giver.

As minister of music and youth at First Baptist Church in Marianna commumity and ministering to prison inmates. But he was just as dedicated to friends and family members, who say they could call on him for help and support at any time.

Mr. Glover died last Thursday at Baptist East Hospital in Memphis two weeks after surgery for a benign brain tumor. He was 36.

One of three sons of Fred Glover, the director of the North Little Rock Water Department, and his wife Carolyn, he grew up in North Little Rock, attending Lakewood Middle School and Northeast High School, managing several ball teams and working as a delivery boy for Fashion Park Cleaners in Park Hill.

But it was at Levy Baptist Church where he found his mission in life as well as his future wife, Becky, daughter of retired Pastor Otto J. Brown.

Another Brown daughter was also dating a Glover boy at the time, and in 1983 Gary and Becky Glover and David and Bobbie Glover married in a double wedding ceremony at Levy Baptist Church.

Mr. Glover soon graduated from the University of Central Arkansas in Conway with a business degree, but a few years later he decided to attend Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary in Fort Worth.

In Texas, Glover worked at Happy Hill Farm Academy, a residential treatment center for children, leading weekly chapel services for the students and teaching high school Bible classes.

But soon the Rev. Allen Greer, a longtime friend from Levy Baptist Church who had become minister of the First Baptist Church in Marianna in 1992, was asking him to come help him with the youth and music program there even before he copleted his seminary studies.

Mr. Glover's integrity and "investment in the lives of other people" made him an ideal candidate for that position, Greer said.

"He was not a judgmental personl. He was a selfless giver who gave of his life," Greer said. Congregation member Steve Edwards agreed.

"He just had a touch. He didn't criticize the kids. He understood that they did a lot of things they did because they were kids," said Edwards, whose two daughters were member of Glover's youth choir.

Mr. Glover also ministered to the inmates at the nearby East Arkansas Regional prison unit in Brinkley, where he met Larry Ashley, an inmate serving a life sentence without parole for murder.

In prison chapel newsletter, Ashley eulogized his former spiritual leader.

"Gary's music was not just in words, but was in a lifestyle that shouted to the world...Some men try to impress you, Gary simply impacted all the people who had the great privilege of knowing him," Ashley wrote. And the impact continues.

Understanding Mr. Glover's deep commitment to other people, his family donated his organs to five other people, something his wife Becky said she and her husband discussed before his sudden death.

"He had given his life to help others, and I knew [organ donation] was something he wanted to do," she said.

The organs went to people living in New York, Alabama, Memphis and Forrest City. But the recipient of Glover's heart is the most miraculous story.

Allison Fogg of Forrest City, went in labor prematurly four months ago. The medication Fogg was given while giving birth to her babyboy damaged her heart, and she became seventh on the heart transplant list at Baptist East Hospital in Memphis.

At the request of some of Fogg's friends who attend First Baptist Church in Marianna, the church began praying for Fogg.

"I didn't even know her, but I was praying for her [recovery]," Becky Glover said.

The prayers were answered last week when Allison received Gary Glover's heart because the heart was not a good match for the six people in front of her on the transplant list."It was just a miracle," Becky Glover said.

But is was in keeping with all that Mr. Glover stood for, his friend Rev. Greer said. "Even in death he gave life to other people."

He was preceded in death in death by his grandfather, Fred V. Glover Sr., and grandmother, Reba Wetzler.

Besides his parents, his wife Becky and three sons, Drew, Daniel and David, all of Marianna, Mr. Glover is survived by brothers and sister-in-law, Bruce and Cookie Brown of Rose Bud; and grandparents, Vergie I. Glover of Guy and Eugene M. Wetzler of North Little Rock.

Funeral services were held last Sunday at First Baptist Church in Marianna with the Revs. Steve Walter and Allen Greer officiating. Burial was at Rest Hills Memorial Park inNorth Little Rock.

The family requests that memorials be made to the Gary GLover memorial Fund in care of First Baptist Church in Marianna.

The Times - May 20, 1999



James Lawson Campbell

Generous and outgoing, he thrived on giving to others

By Nancy Dockter

James Lawson Campbell III delighted in giving to others. Cooking for a crowd on weekends, carrying dishes of food to neighbors, donating time to his favorite charities, volunteering to teach trainees in his profession, and picking out greeting cards for each of his 11 grandchildren, and scores of friends-these are a few examples of what he did for others, family members say.

Mr. Campbel, a longtime resident of New Orleans whose job with State Farm Insurance brought him to Sherwood in 1996, died in his sleep due to pulmonary problems Thursay, May 6. He was 50.

Career Success and many friends were all things Mr. Campbell could point to with pride, yet it was his role as family man that meant the most to him his daughter, Kristan Johnson of Lonoke, said.

"He was most proud of having married a woman with five children," she said.

Mr. Campbell was only 31 years old when on the day after Christmas in 1979 he was married, embracing instant fatherhood as part of that commitment.

"He's always been 'Dad" to us kids," said Johnson."He would do anything for any of us and has helped us all. He had a big heart."

The middle child of three, Mr. Campbell was born June 24, 1948, in Berkeley, Calif., but moved as a young child to New Orleans. His parents, Margaret and James Campbell Jr., now of Houston, Texas, both worked for Shell Oil CO.

After graduation from high school, he attended Nicholls State College in Thibadeaux, La., leving school after two years to begin a career in sales with W.T. Grant.

"He won a sales award the first year," his father recalled. "He was a natural born salesman, Two years later, that knack led him to success in car sales and then as a junior estimator with State Farm.

"He was a typical New Orleans guy," Johnson said. "He'd cook crawfish in a 50-gallon boiler and have anyone, all kinds of people over."

When Mr. Campbell met school teacher Jewel Beth Foster through mutual friends, she at first resisted his interest since he was much younger.

"From the first time they met, he knew she was the one he wanted to marry," Johnson recounted, "so he kept asking her out." The Campbells would have celebrated 20 years of marriage this year.

"They were like they were dating the whole time they were married," Johnson said. "He spoiled her. On holidays he would go nuts..he couldn't wait for Christmas morning for her to open [presents]."

Over his 20 years with State Farm, Mr. Campbell steadily moved up in the company, becoming the head of estimating in New Orleans and skilled in disaster claims work in Louisiana and Arkansas.

Mr. Campbell devoted his spare time to a number of civic works, despite chronic asthma throughout his life and three surgeries for hip replacement. He numbered a neighborhood crime watch, Toastmasters-of which he served as president at least once - and Toys for Tots among his favorite pursuits, along with heading up the State Farm toy drive and helping at a KSSN radio fund-raiser at Christmas.

But he always had time for his grandchildren, looking forward to spending Saturday nights babysitting them.

[And] he never forgot a holiday. Mother says he had more feelings than most men do," Johnson said.

Besides his parents, wife and daughter Kristan and her husband, David, survivors include his brother and sister-in-law, William and Renee Campbell of San Marcos, Texas; sister, Sharon Campbell of New Orleans; son and daughter-in-law Bruce and Michelle Johnson of Mesa, Ariz.; daughter and son-in-law Rebecca and Ron Vahey of Whitehouse, Ohio; daughter and son-in-law Jana and Tom Aspray; and son and daughter-in-law Don and Beatrize Campbell; and 11 grandchildren.

Funeral services were Monday, May 10, in the chapel of Griffin Leggett-Rest Hills Funeral Home in North Lttle Rock. Generous and out-going, he thrived on giving to others

The Times - May 20, 1999


COL. MARTER D. MIDDLETON

Air Force Colonel, AARP director dies at 87

By Nancy Dockter

Retired AIr Force Col. Marter D. "Pat" Middleton, 87, former AARP state director and the first inductee in North Little Rock's Senior Citizens Hall of Fame, treasured family, community and country, his loved one said.

A resident of North Little Rock since 1967 until he moved to Carlisle, Pa., to be near his son and family, Col. Middleton died of a stroke Oct. 30.

His life was rich, "not with material things, but he had family and that had great value," said his daughter, Leslie Powell of North Little Rock.

He learned the importance of family during his childhood in Mississippi. The youngest of five brothers and a sister, he was born March 1, 1911 in Gore Springs Miss., to the farming family of the late Robert L. and Ellafair Marter Middleton.

One of his fondest memories was the sight of his father, the local justice of the peace, stopping his work in the cotton fields to meet with parties to a dispute and give a ruling on the spot, Powell said.

After graduation from high school in Alva, Miss., Col. Middleton taught in a one-room school ther for two years before enlisting in the Army Air Corps in 1932. While stationed at Maxwell Field in Montgomery, Ala., he met Fayla Davis on a blind date arranged by friends, and they married in 1936, a union that lasted 52 years until Fayla Davis Middleton's dath. The couple had two children.

Col. Middleton was commissioned a second lieutenant at the beginning of World War II, serving his entire military career in telecommunications. He set up signal installations worldwide and moved his family at time as often as evey year before he retired in 1964.

His last command took him to Hawaii where he was involved in setting up Defense Area Communication for the Pacific and laying the groundwork for the system which is today's internet.

But he always returned to Mississippi twoce a year, recalled son, Robert Middleton. A high point of these trips for the son were the "many, many great days of bird hunting with cousins and uncles," he recalled. "He would tell me, "When you pull the trigger, you're gonna eat what you bring down, so be sure what you aim at."

Work as a civilian consultant for Pate Communications took him to Vietnam for three years after he retired from the military.

Then he and his wife moved to North Little Rock to be near his daughter. For more that 10 years he was a restaurant business owner and immersed himself in community and political activities focusing on senior citizens' causes.

Powell remembers her father as a "modest man" who played a significant role, along with other dedicated seniors, in getting "AARP up and running in the state." During his tenure as AARP's state director and later as the vice president of its seven state southwestern region, Col. Middleton helped establish the 55 Alive defensive driving program and lobbied for seniors' issus.

He served as a silver haired legislator and a member of the Governor's Advisory Council on Aging. In 1981, he attended the White House Conference on Aging and was a senior intern under then Sen. David Pryor in Washington, D.C.

Col. Middleton's legacy of community service included helping to found Parkstone Place and start the North Little Rock Senior Citizens' Commission, of which he sat as the first chairman.

He also served as chairman of the Area V Agency on Aging (Care Link), the president of the Retired Officers Association, a 33rd degree Mason and was a member of the Kiwanis Club and Lakewood United Methodist Church.

His last years, before moving to Carlisle, Pa., were spent at Good Shepherd Retirement Center in Little Rock where he headed the resident council.

"He was fun," Powell said. "Just last April at the marriage of one of his granddaughters, he danced with everyone."

Col. Middleton is preceded in death by his wife, Fayla Davis Middleton.

He is survived by a son, Robert D. "Denny" Middleton of Carlisle, Pa.; a daughter, Leslie Powell, of North Little Rock; a brother, Tibb Middleton, of Baton Rouge, La.; four grandchildren; two great-grandsons; and a host of other family and friends.

The funeral was Monday, Nov. 2, at St. Luke's Episcopal Church in North Little Rock with Rev. Amy Jobes officiating. Interment was at Little Rock National Cemetery with full military honors. The family requests that memorials be made to favorite senior citizens cause or charity.

The Times - November 5, 1998


VIRGIL D. COX

Country boy turned rail mechanic loved life

By Henry Murphy

Ask Charles Cox if he was close to his Uncle Virgil, and his voice chokes with sadness. "Not as close as I should of been," he said.

Virgil D. Cox had always made quite an impression on his nephew Charles, nine years younger.

"He pretty well took care of me when I was 5 and 6," when his mom and dad had both worked outside the home, Charles Cox said. Back then family took care of the whole family.

Not that this uncle always set the best example, Charles recalled of that day more than 60 years ago when he tried to mimic the action he'd seen in some cowboy movie and nearly did himself in.

"Virgil, he tried to jump off his horse and catch a [tree] limb," he said. Virgil D. Cox died Wednesday, Oct. 4, from a sudden heart attack. He was 75.

Born on a busy family farm in Olmstead, Ark., he was the second to last boy among nine children and just expected, from the age of 5 or so, to help on the land. It was how everybody survived, family members.

"If you didn't farm, you starved," said Virgil's older brother, Jack.

The the farm didn't last, and eventually the kids ended up with the mother, Ada, taking care of horses on land out near Camp Robinson Road. Virgil's nephew Charles has fond memorials of that time, when time moved slower and a big event in their lives was a trek to the movies.

"He like to go to the movies. If you had a dollar back in those days" you could buy a seat, plus all the goodies you could eat - with change left over.

Sometimes, Charles Cox said, his uncle would take him up to their unofficial horse pasture, the ridge that runs through Park Hill above I-40. Then they often rode horses over the Lakewood which was just undeveloped fields and woods back then, even drive their horses through the lakes.

Cox remember his uncle teaching him how to hold on to the house when they went in the water.

"It's not like in the movies," his uncle warned him, wrapping his had up in the horse's mane, real tight before they plunged in.

The poverty of the Great Depression pushed people to be creative, Charles Cox said, and finding little, unexpected ways of making money kept them busy, even when they were very young.

"We would do anything to make some money...During the war, if you could pick up just steel scrap and take it to the scrapyard, it was a few Pennies, you know."

Virgil eventually went to work for Missouri Pacific Railroad. He spent 35 years as a rail car mechanic. But even though he worked full time, he kept up pleanty of commerce on his own time.

"Oh, year," said his brother Jack, of North Little Rock. "He sold anything and everything.

Indeed, Mr. Cox had a passion for trade, and his property out along the Old Jacksonville Highway was always crewded with machinery, tractors, and even chickens, family member said.

"He was raised in the country, and he still got the country in him," said Jack Cox, chuckling at his brother's signature trademarks, established during those days on the farm, for working hard and playing hard, for laughing heartily and enjoying life.

"He always had a tremendous smile and ...noone had a laugh likeh im," Charles Cox said. "He was a great guy. He lived life to the fullest."

He was preceded in death by five brothers and two sisters. Survivors include his wife, Mildred Cox; one brother, Jack Cox of North Little Rock, and several nieces and nephews.

Funeral services were held at 10 a.m. Saturday, Oct. 7 at the Edgewood Pavilion and officiated by the Rev. Larry Ballard. Burial was at Edgewood Memorial Park;

The Times - October 12, 2000


MARTHA J. BLACKSTOCK

Kind, outspoken soccer grandmother, 63, dies

By Nancy Dockter

Funny, spirited and out spoken, Martha J. Blackstock of North Little Rock was loved for her frank nature and good sense of humor. And her sudden death last Friday, say her loved ones, leaves a void that will be impossible to fill.

Attentive to the needs of those around her, she grocery-shopped and cooked supper each night for her mother-in-law who lives next door and enjoyed any opportunity to dote on her six grandsons and one granddaughter.

"Her primary interest was her children and grandchildren," said Wayland Blackstock, her husband of 42 years, recalled. "She'd pick them up from school, take them to soccer, do all things mothers and grandmothers do. She always drove so carefully with them in the car, we'd kid her about getting in the way of all the soccer moms. We called her a 'soccer grandmother'."

Mrs. Blackstock died on her 63rd birthday of complication from a stroke two weeks earlier.

Born in Bisbee, Ariz., she had moved with her family early in life to an 80-acre dairy farm near Lubbock, Texas, where she worked alongside her parents and brother and sister, milking the cows and tending to the cotton fields. She graduated from high school in the nearby town of Shallow Water.

Her love of the outdoors and plants carried over to her adult years, when flower gardening became a pastime, with hibiscus, begonias and sunflowers among her favorites. It was a love she shared with her husband, a nurseryman and former Parks Department director the the city of North Little Rock.

Mr. Blackstock, who came to North Little Rock to run the city's parks in 1966, stepped down in 1979, then returned to the post briefly until retiring to continue in his landscaping business, said that as a player in city government and politics, he leared to be circumspect in his words, a philosophy not altogether shared by his wife.

"I always had to be more thoughtful, to be cautious," he recounted. "I'd telll her, "Think, about what you say rather than saying what you think, and she'd tell me, "That's your job."

But it was her lively nature that attracted Mr. Blackstock to her when the two met on a blind date arranged by a college buddy of his when they were both still teenagers.

"She like to have fun and loved people," he said. "You didn't know what she was going to do next - and sometimes she didn't either.

They were married three years later, then moved to San Antonio after Mr. Blackstock complete his degree in parks administration. From there, they moved to Richardson, Texas, where they lived briefy before settling in Little Rock, where they raised their family of two daughters and one son.

After their children reached school age, Mrs. Blackstock worked for the Federal Reserve Bank in Little Rock for 17 years, retiring as a cash clerk five years ago.

Besides her husband, she is survived by two daughters and sons-in-law Andrea and Gerald Grummer of Sherwood and Paula and Steve Lunn of Lake Charles, La.; one son and daughter-in-law, Brian and Liz Blackstock of Greenbrier; six grandsons, Jacob Grummer, Jordan Grummer, Conner Grummer, Joshua Blackstock, Spencer Blackstock and Brett Lunn; three granddaughters, Janie Lunn, Erica Calavitta and Kristen Grummer; three great-grandsons; one brother, Jimmy Isbell of Colleyville, Texas; one sister, Paula Middlebrook of Lubbock, Texas; and numerous nieces and nephews.

Funeral services were held Monday, Oct. 23, in the chapel of Griffin Leggett-Rest Hills. Burial followed at Rest Hills Memorial Park.

The family requests that memorials be made to Arkansas Children's Hospital.

The Times - October 26, 2000