Induction Year: 2004

James B. Boone, Jr.

  • October 5th, 2021

James B. Boone, Jr., grew up in Tuscaloosa during interesting and tumultuous times, both in the newspaper business and in the civic life of the South. His father, Buford Boone, the courageous publisher of The Tuscaloosa News and winner of a Pulitzer Prize for distinguished editorial writing, made impassioned pleas for justice and reason during the first attempt to integrate The University of Alabama.

As chairman of the board, and majority stockholder of Boone Newspapers, Inc., James B. Boone, Jr.’s company owns and manages newspapers and shopping guides in 35 communities in Alabama, Michigan, Minnesota, Mississippi, North Carolina, Ohio, and Virginia. He has adhered to values set down by his father. His newspapers are recognized as among the best edited and managed in the industry.

Born in Macon, Georgia, to Buford and Frances Herin Boone, Boone got his early education in Tuscaloosa and attended The University of Alabama’s school of commerce and business administration, graduating in 1958. His newspaper training began early, as he worked at the Tuscaloosa News while a high school and college student.

On graduation from UA, Boone was employed and guided by the legendary Carmage Walls, a leading newspaper group publisher of his era and a long-time friend and associate of Boone’s father. With Walls, he served at newspapers in Georgia, Texas, and Virginia, including seven years as editor and publisher of The Suffolk (Virginia) News-Herald.

Boone returned to Tuscaloosa in 1968, succeeding his father and purchasing controlling interest from his parents in Tuscaloosa Newspapers Inc., publisher of The Tuscaloosa News under lease from Public Welfare Foundation. He began acquiring newspapers in 1970. He cancelled the Tuscaloosa News lease in 1981 and the foundation sold The News several years later to its present owner, the New York Times Company.

“We seek to produce the highest-quality product that the economics of the community served can support,” Boone has said. “And then, by ingenuity and imagination, we strive for a higher quality in an effort to serve and build that community.”

Included are numerous newspaper organizations. He is past president of Tuscaloosa organizations like the Chamber of Commerce, the DCH Regional Medical Center Foundation, the Tuscaloosa Academy Board of Trustees, the United Way, the YMCA, the Park and Recreation Authority Board and the Journalism Foundation of the Alabama Press Association. Boone served two communities as United Way drive chairman and served on the Vestry of Christ Episcopal Church.

He retired this year from the board of Regions Financial Corporation, where he was chairman of the corporate governance committee, and he is a member of the board of directors of Regions Bank – Tuscaloosa, and also serves on the board of directors of Randall Publishing Company.

He has won a number of awards, including the Julia and Henry Tutwiler award from UA, where he also has been inducted into the Communications Hall of Fame. The West Alabama Chamber of Commerce has inducted him into the Civic Hall of Fame and he was awarded the Casey Award from the University of Minnesota for newspaper industry leadership.

The assistance he has provided UA is without parallel. He serves on the President’s Cabinet and the National Advisory Board and was a member of the steering committee for the Campaign for Alabama. He is a member of the Board of Visitors for both the College of Communication and Information Sciences and the Culverhouse College of Commerce and Business Administration. Funding full-tuition scholarships for deserving college students has been a prime interest for him, and he has provided a number each year for the last 25 years. In recognition of his wise counsel and unstinting service, The University of Alabama presented him with the honorary degree of Doctor of Humane Letters.

Boone’s business philosophy is as principled as it is simple. He writes: “Our aim, when our product is compared to another’s in a comparable market, is to be judged superior. The communities we serve deserve no less, and doing so is vital to the future of that community and our company.”

He recently was honored by the Alabama Press Association with a Lifetime Achievement Award, which recognizes outstanding service and accomplishments spanning a career in journalism in Alabama. Boone is married to Carolyn Farrior Boone. He has two sons, Kenneth S. Boone and J. Buford Boone III, and three daughters, Martha B. Cobbold, Caroline F. Boone and Catherine G. Boone.

Donald C. Brabston

  • October 5th, 2021

An ancient Chinese proverb says, “One generation plants the trees, another gets the shade.” Early in life, Donald Campbell Brabston learned to plant trees of service for the future and to help others less fortunate. His mother, Mrs. Elizabeth Dameron Brabston, taught him to tithe to his church and serve others. Brabston’s life, including his business career and his civic leadership, has enriched the lives of countless people.

Don Brabston, CPA, was born and raised in Birmingham, graduating from Ramsay High School and Birmingham-Southern College (Phi Beta Kappa). He earned his M.B.A. at Northwestern University, where he excelled in the classroom and as a leader on campus. He was a member of Phi Beta Kappa, Omicron Delta Kappa, Beta Alpha Psi, and Beta Gamma Sigma honorary societies and was president of Alpha Tau Omega fraternity.

When World War II began, Brabston completed Northwestern’s two-year M.B.A. program in a record nine months and immediately joined the Navy. Brabston served on the battleship USS Alabama for two and a half years during World War II and attained the rank of lieutenant commander. He received nine battle stars and Philippine Liberation Ribbons.

One week after returning from the war in 1945, Brabston joined the Birmingham office of Ernst & Ernst (later Ernst & Whinney and now Ernst & Young LLP) where he retired 34 years later as managing partner of the Alabama practice. When he became a partner, the firm’s Alabama practice had a professional staff of 30. Under Brabston’s leadership, the firm’s Alabama offices in Birmingham, Huntsville, and Mobile grew to approximately 200 professional accountants, nearly all of whom were CPAs. He hired the first woman and the first African-American on the professional staff in the firm’s southern offices.

In the 1960s, Brabston saw the need for changes in the way the accounting profession served Alabama businesses. The state’s economy was becoming more diverse with strong growth in the health care, banking, insurance, and high technology industries. Also, Medicare, bank-holding companies, and other new laws regulations, and reporting requirements were dramatically affecting the demands of these industries. Brabston recognized the significance of these changes early on and adopted a strategy of developing and training staff and partners with highly specialized industry skills to address the needs of these fast-growing businesses. At the time of his retirement in 1979, Ernst & Whinney was the dominant professional services firm in Alabama, and the Birmingham office was the firm’s largest office in the South.

Brabston believed in recruiting beyond the firm’s requirements to meet the immediately foreseeable needs of Alabama businesses. This philosophy enabled him to recruit and train outstanding accountants for his own practice and for positions in the firm’s offices around the country. Fellow managing partners knew they could always call on Brabston for help whether the need was for short-term assistance requiring highly specialized skills or to fill a long-term leadership position. As a result, dozens of individuals recruited and trained by Don Brabston went on to serve as partners in firm leadership roles. Three partners (all University of Alabama graduates) eventually became vice-chairmen of Ernst & Young and served on its executive management committee, overseeing the Big Four international firm’s operations around the world.

Don Brabston built a culture at the firm which emphasized active participation and leadership in community affairs. He often told employees that “we should pay our civic rent.” He led by example, setting high standards for service in and supporting important civic affairs.

Don Brabston was a leader in the accounting profession throughout his career. In 1947, he received the Silver Medal for placing second out of about 7,500 candidates nationwide on the Certified Public Accountants examination. Brabston served in active roles with the Institute of Management Accountants for many years. He was a national vice president of the Institute and a member of its national Board of Directors and Executive Committee and president of its Birmingham chapter.

Brabston has long been involved in support of education. He has been honored as an Alumnus of the Year by Birmingham-Southern College and was a founder and the first president of Birmingham-Southern College’s Norton Center, the purpose of which is to foster relationships between the college and business. He served as chairman of The University of Alabama’s Accounting Advisory Board for many years, during which time the University’s accounting department became the School of Accountancy. He is a lifetime member of Samford University Board of Trustees, having served 31 years, and has served as chairman of the executive, business affairs, and investment committees.

During his business career, Brabston was a tireless servant and civic leader. In retirement, Brabston has remained committed to and continues actively serving his community and state.

Brabston served in leadership positions of numerous civic organizations. He served as president of the Birmingham Area Chamber of Commerce and chaired the taxation committee of the National Chamber of Commerce. While Brabston was its president in 1979, the Birmingham Chamber initiated its Crime Stoppers program which offers rewards for tips leading to arrests and convictions for crimes in the city. On behalf of the chamber, he worked hard to promote racial harmony in the city. Following an incident in which an African-American woman was shot by a white Birmingham police officer, Brabston led a negotiating team of community leaders in successfully addressing the concerns of African American citizens. This effort was critical in preventing an economic boycott and potential further serious conflict.

Brabston served as Chairman of the Board of United Way of Central Alabama in 1975, 1976, and 1981 and is the only chairman in the history of that organization to serve three times in that capacity. He was one of the founders instrumental in establishing the United Way Community Food Bank and was a member of its board of directors and its treasurer.

He was chairman of the Salvation Army and recipient of its highest award for a lay individual, the William Booth Award. Brabston has been a trusted advisor to commanders of the Greater Birmingham Area Salvation Army for 40 years and he is an Emeritus Member of the Advisory Board.

Brabston was chairman of the Young Men’s Christian Association of Birmingham for several years and a trustee of the YMCA for over 25 years, as well as chairman of its Capital Funds Campaign. During his tenure as chairman, the first African-Americans joined as members of the Birmingham YMCA.

He served as vice president, treasurer, and a member of the Board of Directors of the Birmingham Football Foundation, Inc., and as chairman of the Board of Trustees of the Alabama Association of Independent Colleges and Universities (for three years), as well as president of the Baptist Hospital Foundation and director of its Baptist Hospital Service Corporation. He was a member of the Community Foundation of Greater Birmingham Steering Committee, as well as a director and member of Rotary Club of Birmingham. He has served on the board of the Birmingham Chapter of the American Red Cross and other civic and charitable organizations, including the Greater Birmingham Convention and Visitor Bureau, Executive Service Corps of Birmingham (as a founder and chairman), and the Metropolitan Arts Council (as chairman of Its allocations committee). He was a member of the first Oil and Gas Board of Alabama.

Brabston is a life deacon and has served as chairman of the board of trustees, chairman of the board of deacons, and chairman of the finance committee (for over 25 years) at Mountain Brook Baptist Church and is a member of the church’s Endowment Trust Fund Board.

While a student at Northwestern, Brabston met and married Mary Jane Coolman, his wife of 53 years until her death in 1996. He has a son, Donald C. Brabston, Jr. of Manhattan Beach, California, and a daughter, Mary Elizabeth Brabston, of Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada, and one grandson, Benjamin Kenneth Forman Brabston of Manhattan Beach, California.

Another old Chinese proverb proclaims, “The best time to plant a tree was 20 years ago. The second best time is today.” Although he paid his “civic rent” long ago, Don Brabston’s dedication to service today at age 83 is as active as it was as a boy when his mother first taught him to tithe. Brabston’s trees of service have grown tall and continue to grow straight and strong. And the shades from his trees have benefited and “will continue to benefit people.”

William L. Halsey

  • October 5th, 2021

Forbes business magazine recently reported Huntsville, Alabama, as the eighth leading location for business and careers. The responsibility for some of that lofty ranking can be attributed to W. L. “Will” Halsey Jr., chairman and treasurer of W. L. Halsey Grocery Company, Inc., of Huntsville, who has been in the grocery business most of his life and has watched as both his family business and the city of Huntsville has grown and prospered.

Halsey was born and raised in Huntsville, the son of William L. and Elizabeth Lowery Halsey. When he was 14, he won an essay contest that awarded him a scholarship to Gulf Coast Military Academy for three years, after which he attended The University of Alabama. When Pearl Harbor was attacked in 1941, he finished his education and entered the Army three weeks after graduation, serving in the Engineer Amphibian Command until his discharge in 1946 at the rank of major.

Meanwhile, back at home, Huntsville was a sleepy little Southern town of about 14,000, surrounded by red dirt and cotton fields. The W.L. Halsey Grocery Company, started in 1879 by brothers William Leroy Halsey and Charles Henry Halsey, was now being run by Halsey’s father, William, and uncle, Charles. But a seed had been planted while Halsey was in the Army and Halsey had his eye on the institutional food business. In 1950 the company embarked on a path of expanding and modernizing as an institutional food service, serving hospitals, schools, nursing homes, restaurants, hotels and motels, clubs, camps, and airlines. Then, in 1955, Halsey became president and treasurer of the firm.

The transition to an institutional food service was not easy. The company was located in downtown Huntsville in a crowded, two-story building with 7,000 square feet on each floor. But the decision to change direction came at the time Huntsville was undergoing a revitalization and

an urban renewal program that required the removal of the railroad tracks that served the Halsey company and other companies in the area. With that in mind, Halsey located a 10-acre site in Madison 10 miles west and began building a 60,000-square foot warehouse and frozen food facility. In 1972, the warehouse was finished and Halsey Grocery Company moved to Madison. In 2000, this facility was expanded to 130,000 square feet which included a meat processing plant and a produce department. The Huntsville downtown building was converted to “Halsey Cash and Carry” and operates today as a branch of the Madison facility. Today, Halsey Grocery Company is bigger than ever. It serves more than 1,800 customers in five states with a full line of items.

Halsey has been very active in a number of national and local industry associations, serving as president of the Institutional Food Distributors of America, president of the Alabama Wholesale Grocer’s Association, and as a member of the board of governors of the National American Wholesale Grocers Association. He is a past vice president of the Continental Organization of Distributor Enterprises as well as the United States Wholesale Grocers Association.

Halsey Grocery Company was one of the five founders of the Continental Organization of Distributor Enterprises, a foodservice distributor marketing organization known today as EMCO. Members of the organization combined their annual volume, which allowed them to negotiate better prices and reduce costs.

He is a past director of First Alabama Bank, Huntsville, and First Alabama Bancshares, a former director of SCI Systems, Inc., and the University of Alabama at Huntsville. As Halsey Grocery Company grew over the years, so did Huntsville, home of NASA’s George C. Marshall Space Flight Center and Redstone Arsenal, the Army’s Missile Research Complex.

Through all the growth, Halsey has been a driving force in bringing new businesses and capital to the area. He was president of the Huntsville Chamber of Commerce in 1955 and chairman of the Huntsville Army Advisory Committee from 1967 to 1992. He also served on a committee set up by Werner von Braun, who pioneered the U.S. manned space flight program.

That led to the formation of the University of Alabama in Huntsville, and Halsey was part of the group that helped raise the money to start UAH. In May 1982, Halsey received an honorary Doctor of Laws degree from the university.

His civic work has earned him a number of honors, including his selection as Outstanding Young Man of the Year in Huntsville in 1955, and being chosen to receive the Outstanding Civilian Service Medal from the Redstone Arsenal on three separate occasions. He received the Chamber of Commerce Distinguished Award in 1989, the same year he received the American Defense Preparedness Association Distinguished Service Award. In 1990, he received the Susan B. Greene Distinguished Service Award from the North Alabama District Dietetic Association.

He is a past president of the Huntsville-Madison County Industrial Development Association, as well as the Huntsville-Madison County Chamber of Commerce. He has served as president of the Huntsville Rotary Club and the Huntsville Golf and Country Club. He is past chairman of the Huntsville city school board and served as vice-chairman of the Huntsville Industrial Development Board and as a trustee of the Huntsville Hospital Board. He is a member of the George C. Marshall Space Flight Center Advisory Committee.

He has been active in fundraising efforts on behalf of the American Red Cross, the YMCA, and the Boy Scouts of America, and chaired the fund-raising drive for Girl Scouts of America, and was a committee chairman for the Community Chest. He also was a key figure in the integration of the Huntsville schools and the water fountains and restrooms of the Madison County Courthouse, as well as in convincing nightclub owners in the city to serve black soldiers.

He is married to the former Miriam Barnes Brennan. He and his first wife, the late Jewel Fernandez, have three daughters, Cecilia, Laura, and Elizabeth. He also has two stepdaughters, Patricia Bidwell and Susan Rivis.

Bernard A. Monaghan

  • October 5th, 2021

The late Bernard A. Monaghan, former chief executive officer of Vulcan Materials Co., was a successful lawyer who left the legal profession to become a successful and innovative businessman as president and chief executive officer of Vulcan Materials Company until 1981.

Vulcan is the largest U.S. producer of construction aggregates, which it sells primarily to the private sector. The construction materials unit operates more than 220 aggregates plants, not including other production and distribution facilities, in the U.S. and Mexico.

Born in Birmingham to Bernard A. and Mary Frances Monaghan, he attended Birmingham-Southern College and earned a law degree from Harvard at 21, after which he traveled to Britain and earned a Rhodes Scholarship at Oxford.

After finishing at Oxford, he returned to Birmingham where he joined the law firm of what is now Bradley Arant Rose and White During World War II he rose to the rank of captain in the Marine Corps and received the Purple Heart and the Bronze Star medal. He remained active in the Marine Corps Reserve, rising to the rank of Lt. Colonel.

In 1948, he became a partner in the law firm and four years later took a leave of absence to serve as Department Counselor for the Department of the Army, for which he received the Exceptional Civilian Service Medal in 1953.

Almost 40 years earlier, the Ireland family had purchased a 75 percent interest in Birmingham Slag, a small Alabama company established in 1909 to process slag from a Birmingham steel plant. Third-generation Charles Ireland became president in 1951 and transformed Birmingham Slag from a regional operation into a national one. In 1956 it renamed itself Vulcan Materials and went public.

Monaghan had worked closely with Vulcan for many years as company counsel and consultant, so it was not a complete surprise when the company’s board of directors hired him as executive vice president in 1958. His hiring came at a time when the company was growing rapidly, expanding its facilities through acquisitions and mergers with production facilities in 12 states.

The firm was undergoing a period of reorganization and transformation from a family-owned business to a national corporation and at 42 years old, it was his responsibility to make sure the transition and reorganization worked.

As the slag supply decreased, the company began acquiring companies dealing in other aggregates, detinning, and chemicals. Monaghan realized the potential of chlorinated solvents, which are used in pharmaceuticals, chemical processing, aerosols, food extraction, paint stripping, dry cleaning and metal cleaning, and specialty adhesives. Detinning takes tin-plated steel scraps and separates the tin from the steel for re-sale.

Under Monaghan’s leadership, Vulcan’s diversification and expansion moved the company into the Forbes 500 ranking. Today Vulcan Materials Company is a leading provider of infrastructure materials required by the American economy. Vulcan Chemicals produces basic industrial chemicals, which include chlorine, caustic soda, hydrochloric acid, potassium chemicals, and chlorinated organics. Vulcan’s chemicals serve many industries and are used in a wide range of modern applications.

Monaghan was an active supporter of education, serving on the board of governors of Indian Springs School and as a trustee at Birmingham Southern College, where he was awarded a Doctor of Humanities degree. He also was a member of the Alabama Rhodes Scholarship Committee. The B.A. Monaghan’s Professorship in Business Administration at Birmingham Southern College is named in his honor.

He received the 1967 Gold Knight of Management Award from the National Management Association and in 1978 he was inducted into the Alabama Academy of Honor. In 2003, he was inducted into the Birmingham Business Hall of Fame.

He was a member of the board of directors of Beatrice Foods of Chicago, South Central Bell, Protective Life, SouthTrust Bank, Avondale Mills, and Southern Research Institute.

He also was a member of the Downtown Club, Mountain Brook Club, The Relay Club of Birmingham, and The Chicago Club.

A leader of cultural affairs in Birmingham, he was a member of Trustees for the Birmingham Civic Ballet, Birmingham Symphony Association, the Rushton Lectures of Birmingham, and a member of the Newcomen Society. He was given the 1972 Brotherhood Award from the National Conference of Christians and Jews.

His other civic interests included: participation as a member of the Executive Steering Committee of the Alabama Heart Hospital; Board of Directors of the Birmingham Committee of 100; Board of Directors of the Alabama State Chamber of Commerce; Director and member of the Executive Committee of the Birmingham Chamber of Commerce; member of the Board of Trustees of the Ireland Foundation of Birmingham; Chairman of the Jefferson County Survey Committee in 1950 to 1952; member of the National Executive Committee and Chairman of the Birmingham Executive Committee for the National Council on Crime and Delinquency; Board of Directors of the National Institute for Public Affairs, Washington, D.C., 1967 to 1973; Board of Directors for the Birmingham Urban League, 1968 to 1974.

Active in fund-raising for civic causes, Monaghan was chairman of the 1967 Ford Foundation Matching Grant Campaign for Birmingham-Southern College; agent for the Harvard Law School Fund from 1956 to 1960; on the Board of Directors for the Birmingham Community Chest, 1960, 1962 to 1966; Chairman, Special Gifts Campaign for the National Conference of Christians and Jews, Alabama Region in 1961 and 1963; Director and Chairman of the 1959 Christmas Seals Campaign for the Anti-Tuberculosis Association of Birmingham; chairman of the 1965 Foundation Committee of the Rotary Club of Birmingham; member of the Board of Directors of the Baptist Hospital Foundation; served the United Negro College Fund as the corporate chairman of the Birmingham Area 1977 Campaign; member of the Alabama Rhodes Scholarship Committee since 1949 and its Secretary in 1972; member of the Steering Committee for the Samford University’s 1970 Decisive Years Campaign.

He was married in 1941 to Margaret Rushton, with whom he had a daughter, Margaret Monaghan. He later was married to the former Mary Jackson Hughes.

John H. Watson

  • October 5th, 2021

John Holman Watson knows a good investment when he sees one. He’s built his life and career around an uncanny ability to recognize good deals early on and make them happen. And he does it so everyone involved benefits from the venture.

Watson was born to Absolom and Mary Outlaw Watson on February 12, 1938, in the small rural community of Skipperville in Dale County.

With the success he has made for himself over the course of his 66 years, you’d think Watson would be beaming with pride. But friends and those that know him say the exact opposite, that even though he may facilitate a business deal and all credit for its succeeding should go to him, Watson would rather others get the praise for his work.

Watson worked a variety of jobs coming up, from delivering ice to carpentry to roof work. When he graduated a year early from Newton High School in 1955 he had a desire to play college football and become an engineer. He had promise as a running back but turned down a scholarship at The University of Alabama for Auburn University’s then superior engineering program. He also figured he could land a position on the football team as a walk-on.

He failed to make the team and was disappointed greatly, even more so when the Tigers won their only national championship that year. But, as he had learned early in life, when something doesn’t go right you have to move on to something else.

The first person in his family to attend college, Watson was a co-op student, working at Redstone Arsenal in Huntsville and The Corps of Engineers at Ft. Rucker, and became involved in the advanced ROTC program at the University. Upon graduating from Auburn in 1960 with a degree in mechanical engineering, Watson married Gail Pearson of Ozark and entered the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers as a second lieutenant.

After serving on active duty in 1961 and 1962 during the Berlin Crisis, Watson and his wife moved back to Dothan where he took a job as an engineer for Smith’s Inc., the largest mechanical contracting firm in the area.

Watson worked 100 hours a week, and in 1966 he and two other employees bought 47 percent interest in the company from James M. Smith. Four years later they purchased the rest of the firm, a transaction made possible by Mr. Smith providing the financing.

Watson considered growing Smith’s Inc. into a regional or national firm but decided it would be better to diversify in other types of business because of ups and downs in the economy and it would enable him to be near home and be able to spend more time with his family. His dealings with Smith and the two partners that helped him buy out the business influenced Watson to want to continue to go into business ventures with friends and partners that he liked, respected and that could add value.

Watson has had his hands in a number of businesses, including Engineered Systems, Inc., a general contracting and design firm performing only negotiated projects. The company specializes in design/build projects on shopping centers, office buildings, warehouses, and industrial buildings. In 1998 the company worked with Auburn University and designed and built the Auburn Indoor Football Practice Facility; Higgins Electric Inc, an industrial contracting, engineering, and electrical supply business; Aladan, Inc., which became the largest latex glove producer in the U.S. and the largest condom manufacturing company in the world; USA Yeast, Inc. a baker’s yeast company built in Hattiesburg, Mississippi, which is the “state of the art” baker’s yeast plant in the world. The plant will produce 1/7  of the total U.S. fresh yeast demand and is the only American-owned baker’s yeast plant in America. (Smith’s, Higgins Electric and Engineered Systems designed and built the two plants); South Alabama Brick Company, which has offices in Alabama and Florida; Southeastern Commercial Financial, LLC, a company specializing in making asset-based loans to businesses and also now has offices in Nashville, TN and Atlanta, GA; and Twitchwell, Inc., a Dothan company with manufacturing facilities in China, specializing in the manufacturer of fabric for the casual furniture market.

Watson’s greatest asset has always been his ability to foresee a business opportunity, weigh rewards against risks, and, if he believes he can make it work, bringing in as many friends and their expertise as he can, spreading good fortune amongst those he likes and respects. He has been described as selfless, soft-spoken, and concerned for others.

Watson has served as a trustee and elder in the Evergreen Presbyterian Church. He has served on the board of Houston Academy, the Dothan Boys Club, the Alabama Research Institute, and the Alabama Industrial Relations.

He was named the 1996 Presidents Council Volunteer of the Year for the Alabama Institute for the Deaf and Blind and serves on the institute’s board. He was the 1988 chairman of the Dothan Area Chamber of Commerce and a graduate of Leadership Alabama. In 1998, he received the Community Service Award from Troy State University Dothan.

He is a past member and Chairman of the Alabama Ethics Commission and currently on the board of directors of Regions Financial Corporation.

He and his wife, Gail Pearson Watson, have a daughter, Abby Jo Watson Down, and a son, John Ronney Watson, and six grandchildren.

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