Volta Francis Goddard (1891-1975)

                                                  Portrait from the Tennessee legislative composite of 1965-66.

  Three-term Tennessee state assemblyman Volta Francis Goddard was for over forty years at the forefront of athletic and political matters in his home county of Blount. A school superintendent in Alcoa for over three decades, Goddard had previously been a rural school teacher and gained wide repute for his decades-long involvement in state athletics. A past president of the Tennessee Secondary Schools Athletic Association, Goddard would serve over twenty years on that organization's board of governors. Born on February 15, 1891, in Blount County, Volta Francis "V.F." Goddard was the son of Nathaniel and Dorcas (Morton) Goddard.

  Bestowed the curious first name Volta, the reasons behind Nathaniel and Dorcas Goddard giving this name to their son are unknown, and the name remains unique, being the only such instance of it this author has found. A student at Maryville College in Tennessee, Goddard graduated in 1913 and continued schooling at the University of Michigan from 1925-26. He received his master's degree from that institution and did post-graduate work at the University of Chicago. 

  Goddard's career in education began shortly after his graduation from Maryville in 1913. Chosen as principal of schools in Chassell, Michigan, he was later elected as city superintendent of schools and continued in that post until at least 1916. In July 1914 he married Elizabeth Irene Funk, about whom little is known. Remarked as a member  "of one of Michigan's prominent families", she and Goddard separated sometime prior to 1921, as he remarried in June of that year to Ruth Lassfolk (1886-1974). The couple was wed for fifty-three years and had at least two daughters, Ruth Goddard Proffitt (1917-1993) and Barbara J. Goddard (born ca. 1927).

  In the early 1920s, Goddard is recorded as a school superintendent in South Dakota, and sometime later removed back to Alcoa, Tennessee. In 1924 he began a thirty-three-year stint as Alcoa city school superintendent, and that long tenure saw Goddard elected as secretary of the County and City Superintendents of East Tennessee for the 1927-28 year. Additionally, Goddard was long active in Tennessee school athletics, being a member of the Tennessee Secondary Schools Athletic Association. In 1935 he was elected to that organization's board of governors, where he served until 1957. He served as TSSAA secretary for East Tennessee beginning in the late 1930s, and by 1942 had become chairman of the TSSAA East Tennessee Board of Control. Eight years later he was named chairman of the TSSAA, succeeding Chattanooga High School principal S.E. Nelson.

From the Knoxville News Sentinel, May 27, 1948.

   Volta Goddard's time as chairman extended from 1950-1957 when he retired, and in 1964 had the Alcoa High School football field named in his honor. In April 1956 Goddard announced that he'd be retiring as Alcoa school superintendent at the end of the year, and within three years of his retirement entered into a new phase of his life--political service. In 1960 he entered into the race for the Republican nomination for the Tennessee state assembly and in August won the primary. In the general election, Goddard defeated Democrat Maggie Love by a vote of 11,072 to 6,547, and took his seat in January 1961.  Nearly seventy years old at the start of the 1961-63 session, Goddard was named to three committees, Education, Highways and Safety, and Local Government.

  Reelected in 1962, Goddard again served on the Highways and Safety and Local Government committees and in 1964 won a third term. During the 1965-67 session, Goddard co-chaired the committee on Agriculture and was named to two new committees, those being Labor, and Welfare and Employment Security. Goddard's final term also saw him introduce legislation that would "allow Tennesseeans 65 years of age and older to fish, trap or hunt without buying a license."

   Following the conclusion of his term Goddard continued residence in Blount County, and in August 1974 suffered the death of his wife of fifty-three years, Laura. He survived her by nearly one year, dying on August 8, 1975, aged 84. Both he and his wife were interred at the Grandview Cemetery in Maryville, Blount County.

From the 1963-65 Tennessee legislative composite photo.

Moyne LeClerque Kelly (1901-1988)

Portrait courtesy of the Texas Legislative Reference Library.

   Hailing from the county of Dickens in Texas, Moyne LeClerque Kelly served two sessions in the Texas State Legislature, being elected as a representative from Dickens County. Both prior to and after his time in state government Kelly earned distinction as a principal and superintendent of schools in both Arkansas and Texas, retiring from his duties in June of 1970.

   Born in Norwood, Pulaski County, Missouri on October 29, 1901, Moyne LeClerque Kelly was the son of John Hazard and Rhoda Garetta Cline Kelly. A graduate of the Corsicana, Texas High School in the class of 1919, Kelly was employed as an oil field worker by the Gulf Production Co. and married his high school sweetheart Helen Marguerite Jones (1902-1991) in December 1919. The couple would later have two daughters, Helen Juanita (born 1925) and Betty Lou (born 1934). During the early 1920s, both Kelly and his wife would be employed by the Methodist Home at Waco, Texas. The couple would remain here for twelve years, with Moyne serving as the manager of the Home's dairy farm and broom factory, as well as being the principal of the Home's Grammar School.

   In 1932 Kelly and his family removed from Waco to Arkansas, where he would teach at a "rural school" in the town of Lonsdale. The Kelly's would move back to Texas in 1933, and after settling in Crosby County Moyne returned to education, serving as the principal of the Leatherwood School from 1934-36. He and his family would move once again in 1936, this time to Lubbock County, Texas. Here Moyne would assume the superintendency of the Roosevelt Consolidated School, and after a two-year term (1935-38), resettled in Afton, Texas, where in 1941 he would take on the position of superintendent of the Patton Springs School.

              Moyne Kelly as principle of the Leatherwood School, from the History of Crosby County, 1876-1977. 

    In 1944 Moyne L. Kelly was named as Superintendent of the State Home at Corsicana, Texas, serving in this capacity until 1949. Two years later he was selected to be the Executive Director of the Texas Board of Hospitals and Special Schools, and after two years in this office relocated to the city of Kerrville to accept the position of superintendent of schools. He and his family returned to Afton, Texas in 1952 and for the next two years would teach school at Patton Springs. In January 1955 Kelly became a candidate in a special election for the Texas State House of Representatives to succeed David Ratliff, who had resigned a few weeks previously, and after winning the election was sworn in on January 8.

  During his first term in the legislature (1955-1957) Kelly held a seat on the committees on Congressional and Legislative Districts, Constitutional Amendments, Municipal and Private Corporations, and State Hospitals and Special Schools. He was a successful candidate for reelection in November 1956, and an election notice for him (shown below) appeared a few months before his victory. In this notice, Kelly intoned that: 

"The matter of passing laws or instituting legislation takes on many forms, if all the people are represented. Laws are passed to protect, to improve, to establish, to prevent; to remove; to alleviate, to inaugurate, to restrain and to help the greatest number of people in the Big State of Texas. If a legislator keeps these things in mind during his deliberations, he cannot be far from right when action is taken on legislative matter."

A Kelly reelection notice from the Aspermont Star, July 26, 1956.

    At the start of his second term in January 1957 Kelly was named to the committees on Agriculture, Judicial Districts, Livestock-Stock Raising, and Penitentiaries. He also continued service on the State Hospitals and Special Schools committee during the 1957-59 term, serving as its chairman.

   Following his time in state government Kelly returned to teaching and in 1968 was once again named as Superintendent of Schools for Patton Springs. He retired from that office in 1970 and died on April 11, 1988, at El Campo, Texas. The 86-year-old retired legislator and teacher was survived by his wife Helen and both his daughters. Following her death at age 89 in 1991 Helen Jones Kelly was interred alongside her husband at the Garden of Memories Cemetery in El Campo. 

  In an aside note, there seems to be some confusion as to the selling of Moyne L. Kelly's middle name, with sources giving its spelling as both LeClerque and Lexlerque. The name is further complicated by Kelly's gravestone in El Campo, which records it as Lee. As the International Genealogical Index gives the name as "LeClerque", it is that spelling that is given in the title of his profile here.