My Paternal Grandparents

Inez Minerva "Sissy" Herrington
b. July 20, 1890, Pensacola, FL, USA
d. January 24, 1986, Pensacola, FL, USA     

My Granny Sissy, as we called her, was the only daughter of Isaac Newton Herrington I (b. 20 Dec 1846 in Laurel, Jones, Mississippi, USA, d. 8 Jan 1913 in Pensacola, Escambia, Florida, USA) and Ezella F. Boykin (b. 26 Aug 1866 in Quincy, Gadsden, Florida, USA, d. 14 Jan 1959 in Mobile, Mobile, Alabama, USA). She had two brothers, Eugene (b. 27 Sep 1886 in Florida, USA, d. 4 Jul 1905 in Brent, Escambia, Florida, USA), and Isaac Newton Herrington II (b. 20 August 1894 in Pensacola, Escambia, Florida USA, d. 20 June 1979 in Mobile, Mobile, Alabama, USA). According to the record of Eugene's death submitted to Ancestry.com by one of my cousins, Eugene's death, which occurred when he was 18, was as a result of drowning in the Perdido River; I do not know the circumstances which led to his drowning, but note that it occurred on Independence Day.

My grandmother was born in Pensacola and lived there her whole life, except for going away for college. During World War I, she served as a Yomanette at the School of Aviation affiliated with the Pensacola Naval Air Station. She was a religious woman and  a charter member of the East Brent Baptist Church. My father has spoken of how she enjoyed inviting visiting preachers to her home for dinner. While in college, she studied education, and subsequent to her graduation she taught for a time in a one-room schoolhouse.

Elmer Bruce Lloyd
b.  May 2, 1886, MI, USA
d. January 19, 1948, Pensacola, FL, USA

My grandfather was the son of Samuel Hughes Lloyd (b. 20 Mar 1849 in Schomberg, Ontario, Canada, d. May 1938 in Saulte Ste Marie, Chippewa, Michigan, USA) and Jane Ellen Higgins (b. 15 Jul 1859 in Canada, d. 1917 in Sault Ste Marie, Ontario, Canada). He grew up in Upper Michigan, in the Saulte Ste Marie area with family on both sides of the border. As a boy, Lloyd, as my grandmother was to eventually refer to him, attended a one-room schoolhouse for a short while, leaving school after either the third or eighth grade, depending upon whose memory is being called upon. However, he was what we now call a life-long learner who enjoyed reading widely, becoming a self-educated man. Lloyd submitted his draft registration card in Chippewa, Michigan in 1917 and joined the navy in January of 1918. According to my dad:

At the end of his first year he was promoted to Chief Petty Officer. After his initial enlistment in Michigan he was transferred to Pensacola and it was my mother who was a secretary on the naval base at the time that handled the paperwork. That was how they met. I know that he served on the Idaho, a battleship that carried three planes on the aft deck and got them in the air with a catapult. Then later he was on the Ranger, an aircraft carrier. When, at the start of WWII, he heard the other old timers complain about the "90 day wonders" it amused him that he had once been in that category himself.

Lloyd's strength, humor, and mechanical know-how were the subject of many of the stories my dad told about his father, and I hope to share some of these in future posts.