The Boy Who Had A Dog Named Tham Went on to Greater Things

Another of my favorite Bessie Britton stories involves five-year-old William Flinn Gilland and his dog Sam. Miss Bessie attributes the original story to Emil Arrowsmith. 

An old newspaper photo of Heller's Livery Stable, where Flinn Gilland inquired about his dog.

The story as Bessie Britton told it goes like this: Emil Arrowsmith liked to tell that when Flinn Gilland was five years old, he really looked like an angel with his fair skin and golden ringlets, and he still had a baby lisp in his speech. Early one morning Flinn's mother sent him to the butcher shop to get a soup bone. On the way home, Flinn had the bright idea to let his big, shaggy dog named Sam carry the package in his mouth. The dog was used to carrying newspapers, but when he got a whiff of that bone, he grabbed the package and took off joyfully for parts unknown. Flinn ambled along in the same direction and came to M.F. Heller's Livery and Sales Stables, where Emil and some boon companions were loafing in straight chairs on the sidewalk. Flinn paused and lisped, "Hath anybody theen a dog named Tham with a thoup bone in hith mouth?" Emil vowed that the morning sunlight on Flinn's golden head formed a halo, the sight of which unnerved Emil and his companions (so) that they couldn't resume their discussion of beautiful women and fast horses or vice versa. They uneasily changed the subject to the current price of oats and hay. But they did give Flinn a dime to get another soup bone.

Given that Flinn was born in July 1909, this story took place sometime between July 1914 and July 1915. The Gillands lived on Academy Street, and Flinn's mother Nell likely sent him down the street to Miller's Meat Market in the business section of town. Flinn apparently did not quickly lose his boyish features, as one of the nicknames attributed to him in the Clemson College yearbook of 1931 is "Baby Face."

1929 college yearbook photo of Flinn Gilland.

Source: ancestry.com

Another of his youthful escapades involved his seventh birthday party, which was held on Saturday, July 29, 1916. Twenty to 30 of his friends gathered at his home, and while they enjoyed playing games and eating cake, "nothing so appealed to the little boys as did the high water around the premises caused by the heavy rainfall that afternoon," according to a report in The County Record. We should take note that flooding along the upper portion of Academy Street was common even in the early part of the 20th century.

But little boys do grow up, and so did Flinn Gilland, and despite his lapse in judgment in letting Sam carry the soup bone, his name appeared on the honor roll all during his school years in Kingstree. He then attended the University of South Carolina before transferring to Clemson where he earned a B.S. in engineering. He then moved back to Columbia where he earned a B.A. from the University of South Carolina, and in 1936, the university hired him as assistant registrar. He also worked for three-and-a-half years for The Columbia Record as a member of both the news staff and the circulation department.

In June 1937, the Associated Press picked up a story involving Flinn Gilland. While swimming in Black Creek near Darlington, he lost his watch. Seven hours later, a group of boys found the watch lying on the creek bottom, still keeping perfect time.

In November 1940, he was involved in a serious automobile accident when the car he was driving was hit at the intersection of Green and Pickens streets in Columbia by a state highway patrolman en route to answering a call. Flinn's car was thrown 40 feet into the side entrance of the Singley Apartments. He, however, emerged from the accident with nothing more serious than severe bruises.

While all of us have our embarrassing moments, not all of them are trumpeted to the world. Poor Flinn had that experience in January 1941, when newspapers all over the country ran the following Associated Press story: Flinn Gilland, Assistant Registrar at the University of South Carolina is in a quandary. He sent out his New Year's greeting cards in envelopes marked, "Do Not Open Until Christmas." 

After the United States entered World War II, he joined the Army Air Corps in 1942, and in 1943, left March Field, CA, for the Pacific Theater. He was steadily promoted, and by April 1945 was a Major assigned as executive officer of the Seventh Army Air Force B-24 Squadron, operating against the Japanese in the Western Pacific. One news article noted, "Although not rated as a flying officer, he completed 19 combat missions as an observer-gunner in B-24s and was authorized to wear permanently air crew wings."

A B-24 "Liberator"

Source: Wikipedia

Separated from active duty service in 1946 as a Lieutenant Colonel, he accepted, in 1947, a commission in the regular Air Force with the rank of Major. And in 1948, he received a Master of Education degree from the University of South Carolina, the first regular Air Force officer to earn a graduate degree from USC under the Air Force's Civilian Institution Training Program for Commissioned Officers. He went on to lead the Air Force ROTC program at the University of Alabama. In 1951 he  moved to Sewanee, TN, where he organized an Air Force ROTC unit at the University of the South and became that university's first professor of Air Science. While at Sewanee, he was also elected as vice-president of the Sewanee Civic Association, which for the unincorporated area around the university took on the duties of a town council and a chamber of commerce.

Flinn Gilland pictured in the 1954 University of the South yearbook.

Source: ancestry.com

In 1955, he became director of administration for the US Air Force group of the Joint US Military Mission in Ankara, Turkey. He was also president of the Ankara-American Education Association which operated American schools there. He received a citation from the American Ambassador to Turkey for this work. From June 1957 until June 1960, he served as Inspector for the 501st Technical Control Wing at Ramstein Air Base in Germany. He returned to Shaw Air Force Base near Sumter in 1960, where he remained as Deputy Commander of the 507th Communications and Control Group until his retirement on October 31, 1962.

During his military career, he received the Bronze Star, the Air Force Commendation Medal with Oak Leaf Cluster for his participation in the 7th Army Air Force bomber missions against Iwo Jima, and the Army Commendation Medal. He was also lauded for his efforts in promoting off-duty education for his officers and airmen. His group maintained one of the finest off-duty records in the Tactical Air Command.

Upon his retirement, he became Director of Admissions at the College of Charleston, and in 1967 became Guidance Director for St. Andrews High School in Charleston.

Lt. Col. Flinn Gilland died in January 1982 at age 72 and is buried in Florence National Cemetery. 

Initials carved into the curb on North Academy Street.

Not long ago, while walking one morning on North Academy Street, I noticed a set of initials carved in the curb across the street from the Williamsburg County School District Office, better known to some as the old Kingstree Elementary School. I had seen the initials before, but it had never occurred to me that W.F.G. is no doubt William Flinn Gilland. Flinn's grandparents once lived on the property now owned by the school district. And so, although Flinn Gilland traveled far and wide from Kingstree during his lifetime and even though he's been gone from this earth for almost 39 years, a little piece of him is still evident here in the old town he once roamed with his dog named Tham.