Hilda Williams Bridges -- Teacher and Genealogist

 

 

Forest Hilda Williams was born on April 7, 1918, in Trigg County, Kentucky at the family farm of her parents, Thomas G. and Vara T. Williams. The family farm is now the entrance to Lake Barkley State Resort Park on Highway 68, near Cadiz, Kentucky. She attended Canton Grade School, and graduated from Cadiz High School in 1936.  She later graduated from Murray State College, now University, in Murray, Kentucky.

Her first teaching assignment was at the one-room Crossroads School in rural southern Trigg County.   Later she was a faculty member at Uniontown and Morganfield Elementary schools, and Union County High School in Union County, Kentucky where she was responsible for developing and operating the first high school audio visual department in the region.

In February, 1945, she married Gilbert N. Bridges, also a native of Trigg County. His occupation with the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers took them to Lock No. 49 near Evansville, Indiana, and Lock No. 49 in Union County, Kentucky. Upon retirement in 1974, they again made their residence in Trigg County. After Gilbert’s death in 2003 she made her home in Murray, Kentucky in 2007. 

Gilbert and Hilda were recognized for their historical and genealogical interests, having published a definitive Thomas and Bridges History. They were also contributing editors to The Trigg County History and she participated in preparing Canton on the Cumberland. They were among the 29 original organizing charter members of the Thomas-Bridges Association, both having served in supportive and leadership roles.

Hilda wrote the preface to her husband’s book, History of the Thomas Bridges Family, in which she vividly describes the early years of the Donaldson Creek area where the two families settled and tells of the hardships and drudgery of growing up in those pioneer times.  She ended her preface by asking our family to “…never, ever forget our ancestors and the role they played in bringing us, their descendants, into this land of milk and honey.”

Hilda was also known for her talent in voice and piano. She was a member of Cadiz Baptist Church, The James Thomas Chapter of the National Society for the Daughters of the American Revolution, Ophelia Chapter No. 55 of the Eastern Star, the Thomas-Bridges Association, the Trigg County Historical Society and other civic and benevolent organizations. 

At the age of nine, she witnessed the untimely death of her eldest brother, Gillis T. Williams and vowed to her mother she would name her first child in his honor.  In June 1946, Hilda gave birth to her and Gilbert’s only child and she fulfilled her promise to her mother by naming their son, Gillis Aaron Bridges after her brother.

Hilda died on May 2, 2012 in Murray, Kentucky and was buried with her husband in the East End Cemetery in Cadiz, Kentucky.

LINEAGE:

(Forest Hilda Williams Bridges was the daughter of Thomas Green and Johnnie Vara Thomas Williams, the granddaughter of William Henry and Sidney Dyer Thomas and the great granddaughter of Stanley and Emily Ann Light Thomas. Stanley was the second child of Starkie and Mary Bridges Thomas.  Starkie was the fourth child of James and Mary Standley Thomas.  Mary was the seventh child of Drury and Charity Cohoon Bridges.)