Audrey Dean Leighton

Notes:

Audrey Dean Leighton was valedictorian and Jerry Morris McDowell salutatorian of Hemphill High School Graduating Class of 1968. (Back in Time, 1968, published in the SABINE COUNTY REPORTER May 6, 1998, page 4).

Sabine County Reporter
July 6, 2005

Audrey Dean Leighton

Audrey Dean Leighton, 55, of Hemphill died Saturday, June 18, 2005, at Memorial Medical Center in Lufkin. He was born Feb. 15, 1950 as a son of the late Geraldine (Pratt) and Morgan Barry Leighton and was a lifelong resident of Hemphill, graduating from Hemphill High School as valedictorian in 1968. He was a global twirler and entertainer. Survivors: a great-aunt, Wilma LOGAN of Hemphill; second cousins, Lloyd Eldon PRATT, Jr. of Harlingen and Patsy Clapp SMITH of Beaumont; and numerours third and fourth cousins. A memorial service will be held 9 a.m. Saturday, July 9, at the Hemphill City Park overlooking the Pratt House. Arrangements are being handled by Starr Funeral Home Inc. in Hemphill.

Friends remember, plan memorial for 'The Twirler,' an East Texas fixture who marched to his own beat

By EMILY TARAVELLA, Cox East Texas

Sunday, June 26, 2005

HEMPHILL - He was the valedictorian of his graduating class. He played the saxophone and was drum major of his high school band. A child of privilege, he was a descendant of one of his hometown's most prominent families.Some considered him to be a parapsychologist and a fortune teller. His closest friends say he was "complex" and "multi-faceted." But when Audrey Dean Leighton died a week ago today, most knew him simply as "The Twirler."

With his long beard, short shorts, tall boots, brightly colored shirts and hats, Leighton stood out against the backdrop of the small East Texas towns and cities where he was often sighted toting his trademark baton. Lufkin, Nacogdoches, San Augustine and others may have tried to claim him as a "town character" all their own, but Hemphill was Audrey Dean's home. It is where he was born, and - for all practical purposes - it is where he died.

A group of women gathered Wednesday afternoon in Hemphill at Pace Creek, an upscale gift shop and plant nursery, to plan Leighton's memorial service. At first glance they appeared an unlikely group of peers for an eccentric, 55-year-old hitch-hiking twirler. But as they shared their fondest memories of the things he said and did, it became clear: These women not only accepted Audrey Dean Leighton, they loved him. Shirley Winslow knew him the longest. "I remember when he was just a little kid twirling his baton," she said. "I watched him grow up."

As Kathy DeKerlegand passed around a file folder containing photographs of Audrey Dean, the women smiled at the images: first a pleasantly plump baby, then a young child with striking eyes and finally a handsome teen wearing a graduation gown. Other photographs featured Leighton as a young man. Eight-by-ten glossies showed him performing on stage; snapshots showed him marching in parades, high-kicking as he twirled his baton. This is how the women will remember their friend - not as he looked in his hospital bed a few days ago, communicating only with blinks and nods. "He died of bone cancer," they said, adding that, "He may have also had a heat stroke."

The folder full of Leighton's pictures also contained his hot-pink business card that reads, "Audrey Dean Leighton, Global Twirler," and the e-mail address, "Twirlerextraordinaire@hotmail.com."
After Leighton graduated from high school and attended the University of Texas and other colleges, he began marching in parades and performing for small audiences who would drop coins or dollar bills in a jar. He was as comfortable twirling on the sidewalks of New Orleans, Phoenix, Los Angeles, Seattle, Washington and New York as he was in East Texas. His "international tour" included France, Spain, Italy and Sweden. On each of his sojourns (paid for with money from his trust fund), Leighton sent postcards home to his friends in Hemphill. He addressed them to entire groups of people, leaving the decision to the postmaster as to which post office box the card should actually be delivered.

When he returned home, Audrey Dean twirled privately for his friends, in their homes or yards. Ten years ago Leighton settled in his family's old home place in Hemphill, The Pratt House. The Pratt House was built in 1908 at the town's most visible intersection by George Edward "Ed" Pratt - the son of Civil War veteran Hampton Pratt. The 7,000-square-foot building has "Greek Revival design influences with Victorian detailing," according to the Sabine County Historical Foundation's Web site. Galleries sweep across the entire front facade, and a two-story portico, gabled dormers and a central hall on each floor are among the home's distinguishing features, the Web site says.

Thirty years ago Leighton's friend Mary Ann McDaniel would visit the The Pratt House to provide home health care for his three aging aunts. "That was back when Audrey Dean spent most of his time traveling," McDaniel said. "He would come in from time to time, but we didn't see as much of him back then." When Leighton returned to the house 10 years ago, it was empty. The three aunts had moved into a nursing home, and for years Audrey Dean entertained them there with his twirling. Eventually, two of the aunts died. A third aunt is still alive today, but Audrey Dean stopped twirling for her when she stopped remembering who he was.

DeKerlegand said visiting Audrey Dean at The Pratt House "was like visiting the theater." "He would sit at the dining table and speak to the (dead) members of his family as if they were really there," she said.

DeKerlegand's mother, Edna Campbell, said she remembers the first time she went inside the house. Although the house had grown shabby from years of neglect, the antiques and crystal inside it took her breath away. Leighton occupied a single room upstairs that had previously belonged to his mother.

When the other heirs to the Pratt estate decided to sell the house to First Baptist Church in the late 1990s, Leighton had no choice but to move. The church planned to demolish the house to make way for a new family life center. But townspeople rallied, and eventually they raised enough money to move the house to a place where it would be safe. Restoration efforts are ongoing, but after the house was moved Leighton never cared to go back inside.

DeKerlegand and Campbell helped Audrey Dean pack his few personal effects when he left the house for good. Everything he owned fit in a wooden trunk that Campbell allowed him to keep in her living room.

Although he never returned to The Pratt House, Audrey Dean would often sit cross-legged on the floor of the Pace Creek gift shop and tell McDaniel and another friend, Donna Alexander, stories about the things that had happened within the home's walls over the last century. The women took careful notes and asked permission to preserve his stories on audio or videotapes. Leighton did not want to be recorded.

"Sometimes he would tell us he had been 'communing with the dead' at the cemetery," Alexander said. "He would visit his relatives' graves, and he would tell us, 'Those Pratts are as tight-lipped in death as they were in life.'" Audrey Dean promised that if he ran across any forgotten Pratt money, he would give it to the historical foundation for the restoration efforts.

After he lost the house, he often slept at the Super 8 motel in Hemphill. He was also known to frequent the San Augustine Inn, and one of Jasper's bed-and-breakfasts. When traveling through Houston he preferred to sleep under a certain tree, using his backpack as a pillow. He had no permanent residence.

Although he had a driver's license, Audrey Dean usually hitched a ride with his friends. Alexander remembers giving him a ride to San Augustine, on her way to market in Dallas. "As he got out of the car, he told me to be careful," she said. "He warned me that there are lot of 'weirdos' out there, and not to give rides to anyone I didn't know."

Some may have been startled by his unusual appearance, but McDaniel said anyone who took the time to talk to him could immediately sense that he was harmless.

When McDaniel's cousin, a Dallas socialite, met Leighton for the first time, she was enamored of his twirling ability. "She had been a twirler in college," McDaniel said. "They went out in the yard and twirled together for hours." Time passed, and McDaniel's cousin was riding through the streets of Dallas with her "socialite friends," McDaniel said. "When they got to a stop light, some of the ladies started locking their doors and pointing to a man on the sidewalk," McDaniel said. "My cousin looked out, and who was it but Audrey Dean - right there in downtown Dallas."

The Twirler was liable to be sighted any place at any time, according to his friends. DeKerlegand was friends with Leighton for years before she learned that her brother had been giving him rides in Marshall. As the women laughed about their memories, the conversation turned to Leighton's last days.

On June 1, he returned from a trip to Nacogdoches with an upset stomach. Alexander gave him a ride to the Super 8, and he told her he thought he had a stomach virus. When the hotel management hadn't seen any sign of him three days later, they called his friend Donna Wilkerson and asked her to check on him. "I knocked on the door and told him I was coming in," Wilkerson said. "He was coherent to some extent, but he couldn't walk. I told the hotel to call an ambulance." Leighton died in a Lufkin hospital two weeks later. He had just enough money remaining in his trust fund to cover the cost of his cremation. "He told us he didn't want his ashes in one place," DeKerlegand said. "He wanted them spread."

Leighton's parents divorced when he was a baby, and his father was "never in the picture." At the time of his death, Leighton's only family ties were two distant cousins and one aunt.

Although his cousins currently possess his ashes, Audrey Dean's friends are hopeful that they will be allowed to spread them, as he requested. The friends said they would like to take a few of his ashes with them when they go on trips to different states and countries. They also hope to keep a few of his ashes in an urn in his upstairs bedroom at the Pratt House. They hope to make his old room a place people can visit to remember the man who added so much color to the East Texas landscape.

"We have his hats, his boots and his batons," DeKerlegand said. "We also have his journal, but it is filled with his most personal and innermost thoughts. I hope it is something I can share some day, but now is not the time."

McDaniel said she'll never forget the last time she saw Audrey Dean, at the end of May. "He was in the bank parking lot," she said. "I had heard through the small-town grapevine that Audrey Dean had become a Christian. I asked him if it was true that he had made a profession of faith."
He said that it was.

"Oh my goodness, you're my brother in Christ!" McDaniel remembers telling Leighton. He responded, "It sure looks that way." McDaniel was preparing to leave for a mission trip in Africa, the last time she saw Leighton. Because "you never know what might happen," she had prepared her will. She remembers telling Leighton, "If I don't see you again ..." and him finishing her sentence for her, "... I'll see you in glory."

"He was telling me good-bye," McDaniel said. "Without even knowing it, that was our goodbye. It was the end of a 30-year friendship." The Twirler's friends said they accepted him just as he was, because he accepted them just as they were.

"He had a gentle, gentle spirit," McDaniel said. "And everyone wanted his beautiful legs."

Trailer for "Rainbows End"

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wkz4Hy114-M

Notes:

Name: Morgan Barry Leighton
Death Date: 06 Aug 1962
Death Place: Houston, Harris, Texas
Gender: Male
Race:
Death Age: 61 years 7 months
Estimated Birth Date: 1901
Birth Date: Janaur 6, 1901
Birthplace: Milwaukee, Wisc
Marital Status: Married
Spouse's Name:
Father's Name: Unknown
Father's Birthplace:
Mother's Name: Unknown
Mother's Birthplace:
Informant: Mrs. Ella Leighton
Occupation: Accountant
Place of Residence: 5227 Clay Ave
Cemetery: Forest Park
Burial Place: Houston, Harris, Texas
Burial Date:
Additional Relatives:
Film Number: 2117025
Digital Film Number: 4028544
Image Number: 795
Reference Number: cn 49367
Collection: Texas Deaths, 1890-1976


(Medical):See attached sources.

Morgan married Geraldine Pratt. Geraldine (daughter of Audrey Grimm Pratt and Faye B. Woods) was born on 15 Feb 1915 in Sabine County, Texas; died on 29 Mar 1973 in Sabine County, Texas; was buried in Hemphill City Cemetery, Hemphill, Sabine County, Texas. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Notes:

Name: Geraldine Pratt Leighton
Death Date: 29 Mar 1973
Death Place: Hemphill, Sabine, Texas
Gender: Female
Race:
Death Age: 58 years
Estimated Birth Date: 1915
Birth Date: Feb 15, 1915
Birthplace: Texas
Marital Status: Divorced
Spouse's Name:
Father's Name: Audrey Pratt
Father's Birthplace:
Mother's Name: Fay Woods
Mother's Birthplace:
Informant: Audrey Dean Leighton
Occupation: Nurse, Medical
Place of Residence: Parker Blvd, Texas
Cemetery: Hemphill Cemeterey
Burial Place:
Burial Date:
Additional Relatives:
Film Number: 2242621
Digital Film Number: 4167715
Image Number: 1758
Reference Number: 23512
Collection: Texas Deaths, 1890-1976


(Medical):See attached sources.

Notes:

Name Audrey Grimm Pratt
Death Date 14 Feb 1949
Death Place Sabine, Hemphill, Texas
Gender Female
Race
Death Age 52 years 5 months 13 days
Estimated Birth Date 1897
Birth Date
Birthplace
Marital Status
Spouse's Name
Father's Name George E. Pratt
Father's Birthplace
Mother's Name Sallie Gellity
Mother's Birthplace
Informant Mrs. Fay Pratt
Occupation Farmer
Place of Residence Old Pratt House, Hemphill
Cemetery Hemphill Cemetery
Burial Place
Burial Date
Additional Relatives
Film Number 2223120
Digital Film Number 4031764
Image Number 3028
Reference Number cn 8502




(Research):Census Information:

106-106
Pratt, Audrey G Hd M W 36 M 20 Tx Tx Tx Farmer
Pratt, Fay W Wife F W 37 M 21 La Tx La
Pratt, Geraldine Dtr F W 15 S Tx Tx La

(Medical):See attached sources.

Audrey married Faye B. Woods. Faye (daughter of Jefferson Davis Woods and Maude Blanche Montgomery) was born on 23 May 1893 in Texas; died on 1 Sep 1966 in Hemphill, Sabine County, Texas; was buried on 2 Sep 1966 in Hemphill City Cemetery, Hemphill, Sabine County, Texas. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Notes:

Name Faye Woods Pratt
Death Date 01 Sep 1966
Death Place Hemphill, Sabine, Texas
Gender Female
Race W
Death Age 73 years
Estimated Birth Date
Birth Date 23 May 1893
Birthplace Tx
Marital Status Widowed
Spouse's Name
Father's Name Jeff D Woods
Father's Birthplace
Mother's Name Blanch Montgomery
Mother's Birthplace
Occupation
Place of Residence
Cemetery
Burial Place
Burial Date
Additional Relatives
Film Number 2118408
Digital Film Number 4027203
Image Number 2609
Reference Number v X cn 69020


(Medical):See attached sources.

George married Sarah "Sallie" Gellatly on 5 Oct 1889 in Sabine County, Texas. Sarah (daughter of William Gellatly and Mary "Mollie" Cassandra Collier) was born on 11 Jan 1870 in Texas; died on 22 Oct 1943 in Hemphill, Sabine County, Texas; was buried in Hemphill City Cemetery, Hemphill, Sabine County, Texas. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Notes:

(Research):

Census Listings:

1930 Census
Texas, Sabine County, Pr. 1, Hemphill Town
Enumerated 8 Apr 1930
ED 202-2 SD 17 Sheet 2B
34-45
Pratt, Eldon Head M W 31 M 26 Tx Tx Tx Dealer Timber
Pratt, Pauline L f F W 25 M 20 Miss Ala Tnn
Pratt, Loyd E Son M W 1 9/12 S Tx Tx Miss
41-47
Pratt, Sallie Head O 10,000 F W 60 Wd 20 Tx NY Miss
Pratt, Doris Dtr F W 21 S Tx Tx Tx
Pratt, Dorothy Dtr F W 21 S Tx Tx Tx
Gellatly, Mary B Mother W 82 Wd 19 Miss Ga Miss

Notes:

Name: Jefferson Davis Woods
Gender: Male
Burial Date: 28 Apr 1945
Burial Place: Van Zandt Co, Tx
Death Date: 27 Apr 1945
Death Place: Edgewood, Van Zandt, Tx
Age: 83
Birth Date: 04 Mar 1863
Birthplace: Texas
Occupation: Retired Farmer
Race: White
Marital Status: Married
Spouse's Name:
Father's Name: A. J. Woods
Father's Birthplace: Texas
Mother's Name: Eliza Curtis
Mother's Birthplace: Texas
Indexing Project (Batch) Number: B00013-4
System Origin: Texas-EASy
Source Film Number: 1763262
Reference Number: v 5 p 453
Collection: Texas Deaths and Burials, 1903-1973

Barbara Yancey Dore indicates he was married multiple times.


(Research):

Census Listings:

1900 Census
Louisiana, Sabine Parish, Many Town
Enumerated 1 Jun 1900
SD 4 ED 91 Sheet 7A
San Antonio Avenue
8-8
Woods, Jefferson D Head M W Jan 1865 35 Wd 17 Tx Tx Ala Salesman
Woods, Myrtle Dtr W F Apr 1883 17 S La Tx La
Woods, Allen Son W M Jan 1887 12 S Tx Tx La
Woods, Fay Dtr W F May 1891 9 S Tx Tx La
Woods, Ruby Dtr W F Jun 1894 5 S Tx Tx La
Woods, Minnie Dtr W F Dec 1898 2 S La Tx La
Montgomery, Vann D Jan 1875 25 S La La Miss Printer
9-9
Woods, Harry S Head W M Sept 1861 38 M Mich England Scotland Buther
Woods, Minna Wf W F Aug 1864 36 M 4/4 England Canada Canada 1867 32 Na

Jefferson married Maude Blanche Montgomery about 1882. Maude (daughter of Adoniram Judson Montgomery and Laura Georgetta Mabry) was born about 1864 in Sabine Parish, Louisiana; and died. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]