Carolyn Wilson spent more than two decades helping newspapers around the state as executive director of the Mississippi Press Association.
The Sandy Hook resident was inducted into the Mississippi Press Association’s Hall of Fame at the group’s annual convention, which took place in Biloxi July 8. Wilson and Will Norton, founding dean of the Meek School of Journalism and New Media at the University of Mississippi, were this year’s inductees and were honored during the MPA’s Better Newspaper Contest Awards Luncheon held at the Golden Nugget Casino.
“I was with MPA for 25 years and was executive director for 22 of them,” she said. “I began in January of 1982. Becky Simmons was the manager at the time and the board told us that we had enough money to operate through October. It was just the two of us and we were in a little tiny building on State Street in Jackson. We had to figure out a way to keep the doors open or else it would be the end. During that time, Becky and the board came up with some creative ideas and we figured out how to keep the doors open.”
When Simmons left in 1985 to join the staff of the Northside Sun, Wilson was chosen for the job.
“The Board offered me the opportunity to be the director, and the rest is history,” she said. “The press service had been started in 1978 and when I came in 1982, it was fairly small. Before 1985, we had grown it substantially. By the time I left, I think we were doing something like $5 million in business per year. We went from not having enough money to operate through October in 1982 to that.”
The MPA has a number of roles in Mississippi, from procuring statewide advertising for newspapers to providing scholarships for students. It is a trade group that represents the state’s newspapers in all aspects of what they do.
Wilson said she was humbled by the induction into the Hall of Fame.
“I never felt like I was qualified for the Hall of Fame since I had never actually worked at a newspaper,” she said. “Lucky for me that the committee and board felt otherwise. It was a big honor. A lot of things happened in those years I was there.”
Wilson retired from the MPA in 2007.
“It was a good time for me to retire because things had changed so dramatically,” she said. “When I first became manager, we didn’t even have a computer at the Press Association. I can remember our first little Mac. We thought we were uptown when we got that. It’s come a long way.”
Wilson has been connected to Marion County for more than two decades and she and her husband, Harry, have lived here since the early 2000s.
“I’m from Arkansas originally,” she said. “We bought this place back in 1995. For several years, I commuted to Jackson. I’d go up on Monday and come back on Friday. I commuted from 1995 to 2007.”
It was chance that got the Wilsons to move south from Jackson to Sandy Hook.
“We showed horses,” Carolyn Wilson said. “In 1992, we met Ted Regan, who was from the Cheraw area. Ted was showing this nice palomino mare. I was interested in getting a western pleasure mare. I had won a national title with a halter mare a few years before, and was interested in doing western pleasure. Ted was winning everything he rode this mare in. My husband started talking to him and he said he would be interested in selling her. To make a long story short, we came down that Sunday for me to try the mare. We ended up buying the mare, she was three years old. She’s in my barn today and she’s 28 years old.”
Wilson said she came to Marion County Tuesday nights, Thursday nights and on the weekends to take riding lessons from Regan.
“He said, ‘You’re never going to be able to show her and win unless you let me teach you,’” she said. “For about eight weeks we did that. During that period of time, this home (located off Mississippi 35 South) was a working horse farm. A few years after that, it went into bankruptcy. It grew up and looked pretty bad. Ted told us that it was for sale. My husband had to have it. We had made a lot of good friends down here. He negotiated with the bank for about six months and we got it bought in 1995. There was no house on the property.”
The Wilsons customized one of the barns, eventually adding on to it in what is now their home.
“Our master bedroom was the hay loft,” Wilson said. “It was part of a four-stall barn that we had made into a cabin. We made it into two bedrooms and a little kitchenette. My husband came on down and got his business started down here. He had a landscape business in Jackson. He worked to get his business established before I retired. So I commuted by myself. In the meantime, I designed the house that is built over and around the little barn. We made it into a rustic lodge kind of thing. It’s unique to say the least.”
Wilson said she also enjoys the people of Marion County and she has watched the church they attend, Sandy Hook Baptist grow over the years.
“When we started here, Tommy King, the president at William Carey University now, was preaching here,” she concluded. “In retrospect, I believe the Lord brought us here and continues to bring special folks across our paths that have an impact on our lives; Dr. King, Richard and Leigh Price, Ted Regan, and many others. God has also presented us with opportunities to serve others and I'm thankful for our good health that allows us to do so.”
Pictured Above: Mississippi Press Association Executive Director Layne Bruce presents MPA Hall of Fame inductees Carolyn Wilson and Will Norton with plaques at the recent banquet in Biloxi. | Submitted Photo
