See story in Saturday’s paper
The blood coursing through his veins ran Midway Raider blue, but when it came to how G.H. Wilson represented children on the Sampson County Board of Education, he never saw color, district, rich or poor — he saw educational need and promise, and he worked tirelessly to correct the one and emphasize the other.
Wilson died Sunday at the age of 73, but his memory and the tenancity for which he fought for educational excellence during his long-time service on the county school board will live on for decades to come, through both his family and friends as well as through the indelible mark he made on the educational system from which he was also a product.
Wilson was a native Sampsonian and a 1971 graduate of Midway High School. He never ventured too far from that district, living and operating a business just a stone’s throw from both the older high school (now Midway Elementary) and the new one he helped usher into existence.
“No need to leave God’s country,” Wilson remarked more than one time during breaks from school board meetings when talk would turn to his beloved Raiders and the close proximity he had to the schools he loved so dearly.
But despite being on the Midway sideline as a volunteer coach alongside long-time head coach Tommy Sloan, Wilson could see beyond his love of the blue and white to his love for children and his desire to have the county school system be a premier educational institution, and he worked alongside fellow board members and superintendents like Dr. Larry Bell to approve policies and procedures that would ensure excellence. He supported teachers, too, and did all he could to see that they were rewarded for their efforts to teach children.
His efforts, paired with those of a school board that worked fluidly together, made the late 1990s in Sampson County Schools good academic years for students.
During his school board tenure, Wilson served as chairman in 1996, 1997, 2011, and 2012, and was instrumental in the funding, implementing and remodeling of several schools across the county, in nearly every district. He served two terms on the North Carolina School Board Association’s board of directors, serving as chairman of the Goals and Objectives Committee for two years, the NCSBA Legislative Committee for two years. For those and many other efforts, he was chosen as All State School Board Member by the NCSBA in 2011.
Even after health issues forced him to relinquish his seat, Wilson remained active in the schools, continuing to serve on the Midway District Advisory council and filling his seat in the stands — and sometimes, still, the sidelines — at Raider football games.
His love for education, the Raiders and, of course, the Duke Blue Devils, only paled in comparison to the love he had for this family — wife Kathy, his children and his beloved grandchildren, the apple of his eye and his long-time commitment to his church, Hickory Grove Baptist, where he was a member for 48 years and served on the Board of Deacons, as an assistant Sunday school teacher, assistant Sunday school superintendent, and on the Budget and Finance and Building and Grounds committees.
Wilson was also a 47-year member of Mingo Lodge #206, serving as Master in 1993. s. He served as the Grand Tyler of the Grand Lodge of North Carolina in 2006, as District Deputy Grand Master for three years, was a member of the Scottish Rite Bodies for 39 years, a member of the Sudan Shriners for 39 years, member of the Sampson County Roadsters Parade Unit, Sampson County Shrine Club member for 39 years serving as both president and treasurer during his tenure.
He believed in service, borne out by his years of active involvement in so many organizations whose tenets began and ended with helping others.
For all those and many other efforts, Wilson was awarded the N.C. Order of the Long Leaf Pine Award in 2012, the state’s highest civilian honor.
Affable and, sometimes, comical, Wilson loved life and tried to live each day to the fullest.
“You get from life what you put into it,” he said in an article the Independent wrote about him in a profile series on school board members in the 1990s.
Wilson got a lot out of life and, to his credit, he gave a lot of that life to others.