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As I was preparing this week's story on recent ribbon-cuttings
at Western Carolina University, it occurred to me that I knew almost
nothing about the woman who gave my favorite WCU building its name.
That's not to say I can't rattle off a series of facts about Gertrude
Dills McKee (I was a history major after all), but I started to wonder
about her personality and how she was seen by her neighbors and family.
First, a few of those facts. The daughter of Dillsboro founder William
Allen Dills, Gertrude McKee married E.L. McKee of Sylva, an early developer
and associate of C.J. Harris. She was born in 1885, before either Dillsboro
or Sylva was incorporated, and she died in 1948 after being elected
to a fourth term in the N.C. Senate but before she served that fourth
session. She was the first woman to be elected to the N.C. Senate.
A prominent Democrat, Gertrude McKee was a delegate to all four national
Democratic conventions that named Franklin Delano Roosevelt as their
party's nominee.
Regardless of those accomplishments, and because of the social customs
of her day, Gertrude McKee was referred to in the May 3, 1944, edition
of The Sylva Herald as "Mrs. E.L. McKee."
I learned about her role in nominating FDR four times from that article,
which credited "Mrs. McKee" with that distinction and added
that it was "a distinction few have had, and especially women.
It turns out that in spite of all her achievements, including serving
on the boards of trustees of four colleges simultaneously (WCU, Brevard
College, UNC-Chapel Hill and Raleigh's Peace College), Gertrude McKee
was "plain as an old shoe," according to Rachel Phillips of
Sylva.
"She was witty and jolly, not high-falutin' at all, but very aristocratic-looking,"
Phillips said. "She made everybody feel special."
When Phillips was born in 1919, Gertrude McKee gave her the wicker baby
carriage she had used when her own sons were small, Phillips said.
"I remember that carriage," Phillips said. "It was in
our family awhile."
Phillips also remembers Gertrude McKee's kindness during a sad time.
"I remember when my father died - I was 12," Phillips said.
"They had brought his body back to the house, and everybody came
by. Mr. and Mrs. McKee were at our house, and she told me and my two
cousins to go up to her house and make ourselves at home. I guess she
thought we looked out of place with all the grown-ups.
"When she came home later, she made us sandwiches and hot chocolate
before we left," Phillips said.
Gertrude McKee's eldest son, William Dills McKee, 89, who now lives
in Asheville, also said his mother had a good sense of humor.
"She liked to tell jokes but not risque ones," he said.
W.D. McKee called his mother's personality "hard to describe,"
and said that "She didn't drink - she didn't need to because she
could go to any kind of gathering and chat vivaciously. She was outgoing
and really liked people."
He remembers being impressed by his mother's ease in front of crowds
and skill at public speaking.
"Once when I was visiting her in Raleigh, she'd been asked to make
the commencement address at Peace College," he said. "I asked,
'Mother, have you written your speech?' She said, 'I don't have to write
it down - I know what I'm going to say.'"
His mother displayed no nervousness at all when addressing groups, and
he never saw her use any notes, W.D. McKee said.
One story about Gertrude McKee made the newspapers during her years
in the state Senate, W.D. McKee said.
"She was the only woman in the Senate at that time, and a bill
came up that had something to do with child labor.
Mother wanted some provision of it changed, and in the course of her
advocating her point of view, she said, 'I've raised two boys at home,
and I think I know more about boys than anyone else in the Senate.'
Another senator said, 'I'd like to ask the senator from Jackson how
she knows more about little boys than we do when we used to be little
boys ourselves.'"
W.D. McKee also shared a story that he said his parents used to tell
with amusement about each other. It seems that when she received her
honorary doctorate from UNC-Greensboro, Dr. Frank Porter Graham, the
university president said many complimentary things about her, W.D.
McKee said.
"It sort of got to my father's ego, to hear his wife praised so,
and he teased her and said, 'I guess next you'll be getting a degree
in veterinary science.' And she said, 'I guess I deserve one - I've
lived with a jackass for 30 years.'"
Young Gertrude Dills received little formal education due to the scarcity
of local schools in the waning years of the 19th century, W.D. McKee
said. Her father, who built the Jarrett House, then named the Mt. Beulah
Hotel, constructed his family's home next door to the inn, and Gertrude
received most of her lessons from guests who stayed there, her son said.
"But when she went to Peace College, she made the highest grades
ever," W.D. McKee said. "She was very intelligent."
His mother loved the church and sang in the choir at Sylva Methodist,
W.D. McKee said.
Ironically, though the McKees were stalwarts at the Methodist church,
Sylva First Baptist Church is now located on the site of E.L. and Gertrude
McKee's former home.
The large copper beech in the Landis Street corner of the church's lot
was no taller than 5 or 6 feet when his parents planted it in 1924 or
1925, W.D. McKee said.
His parents owned 2 acres, and the back part had always been used as
a garden and orchard, W.D. McKee said.
But around the time he was born, his parents decided to make a formal
garden out of it and did so with the help of landscapers.
"My mother was very proud of her garden," he said. "Then
I grew up enough to start playing baseball and basketball. We kept the
grass worn down, and it was no longer a beautiful garden, but Mother
didn't mind. She was glad for everyone to gather there in the afternoons,
and she forgot about keeping it a garden - turned it over to the children,
and everyone called it 'the park.'"
Legendary Sylva author John Parris was among the boys who gathered to
play ball in the McKee "park."
According to W.D. McKee, his mother was very proud when WCU's McKee
Building was named in her honor in 1939.
"She was enormously pleased that (WCU) named something for her
while she was still alive," he said. "So many people are honored
after they're dead, and they never know it.
"Mother loved Western," he said.
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