Sweet Tea Trio performed before a record crowd estimated at over four thousand people who enjoyed the free concert Friday night, June 2 at the 9-1-1 festival in downtown Haleyville. The concert with headliner Diamond Rio was sponsored by the Haleyville Area Chamber of Commerce and the City of Haleyville. The festivities continued through Saturday with antique car and tractor shows, multiple vendors, and kids rides and activities.

A combined HHS Alumni/9-1-1 Festival parade with the Haleyville Rotary Club Miss 9-1-1, Ashton Steele, 15, a Winston County High student was held Saturday Morning.

 At noon the HHS Alumni luncheon was held at the Haleyville Elementary School.

Samuel Lee Masdon, III was honored as the 2017 Alumnus of the Year at the luncheon in a presentation by the Alumni Association President Debbie Wood.

     In 1941 World War II was now raging and the United States had become an intricate player in the war. Many young husbands and fathers were called to duty and had to leave their families to report both at home and abroad. This happened to families here in Haleyville and our Alumnus of the Year, who was not unlike many others of that time, said goodbye to his father and along with his mother and sister moved in to live with his grandparents.

The first day of school began as usual in 1941.  The children were then told about the different things they would be learning during this first school year……about recess and about lunch and about what they would study. Mrs. Rutland, their teacher,  introduced them to all the books they would be using as they learned to read. They would be expected to read all of them by the end of the school year.

     The following week our honoree began his second week of school. He arrived at his classroom only to realize that in the previous week he had already read all of the first-grade books required! Mrs. Rutland simply took him by the hand, out the big wooden door, down the hall to the next classroom.  She walked over to a lady behind a large wooden desk, spoke quietly to the seated teacher, walked back over to the child and said, “Today you are in the second grade.”

From that day forward our honoree never looked back. He kept moving with determination and anticipation up the halls of his life. Always with a book in his hand and always with a desire to know more and to be more. For that journey and for all the accomplishments along the way we today proudly honor

Samuel Lee Masdon, III…..our 2017 Alumnus of the Year.

How many HHS alumni have, in the past, going to the lengths Sam Masdon has gone to – to be successful in life?  In the early 1950’s in Winston County, Alabama, money was hard to come by.  Forty hours work at the local cotton mill would have paid $16.00.  How many of us with little means would hitchhike hundreds of miles to find a better paying job that would offer greater opportunity to succeed in life?  Sam Masdon found a way, including higher education, to make things happen for himself in a positive way. 

During Sam’s days at Haleyville High School, he developed a talent for playing the game of baseball and he excelled in the game.  He would also continue a steady progression into the knowledge and reasoning of all things provided during his early years of study.  He was only 16 years old when he became a senior at Haleyville High School. 

During the time as a student at Haleyville High School, the athletic motto was “A quitter never wins, and a winner never quits.”  There was no quit in Sam Masdon.  He earned his way by working hard and saving. 

     Money was hard to come by for families in those days. Like other young men his age, Sam set out hitchhiking to Detroit, Michigan in search of the money to be made up North. He, in fact, got a job with the Ford Motor Company. He also decided that since he loved baseball and since he was in Detroit that he would try out as a catcher for the Detroit Tigers. Not a bad effort for a sixteen-year-old boy.

In fact, Sam ended up on one of the Tigers farm teams within the minor leagues. He left Detroit and became a catcher in the Alabama-Florida League.

After the end of his first adventurous year on his own,  Sam joined the Navy and was assigned to work with NATO in the intelligence field.  They shipped Sam overseas and was stationed in Naples, Italy. 

In 1958, Sam met Pina and they were married in her hometown of Naples. 

After two years in Naples, Sam was discharged from the Navy and he and Pina returned to Alabama.  He enrolled at the University of Alabama in Tuscaloosa.  He never quit in the classroom where he graduated college in just nineteen months obtaining a difficult degree in French.  He never quit.  He has never stopped learning today, fluent in four languages…French, Italian, Spanish and German.   

     Armed with his degree, his ability with languages and his previous service in the Navy, Sam was commissioned as an intelligence officer in the United States Air Force. During the Vietnam War Sam was sent to Saigon and as an intelligence officer, Sam plotted the bombing raids for our airborne forces. For his exemplary work in understanding and plotting these raids, Sam was awarded the Bronze Star. After this tour in Vietnam,  NATO reassigned Sam to work in intelligence in both Italy and Turkey for the next four years. He and Pina would live with their children in her home country of Italy during this time.

     In 1974 Washington decided to return Sam to the United States where he was assigned to the Pentagon and carried out several top secret intelligence assignments. His ability to handle these situations and his calm and caring demeanor made Sam an excellent choice to debrief the United States Air Force prisoners of war as they were released from Vietnam.

      Once again NATO stepped in and from 1974 until 1977 NATO assigned Sam to the NATO headquarters in Turkey, Greece, and Italy. At the end of 1977 and after twenty-three years of service to his country, Major Samuel Lee Masdon, III retired from the United States Air Force.

      Returning to America, and following Sam’s retirement from the Air Force, he made the decision to pursue a law degree, while settling into his hometown of Haleyville.  Within three years, he graduated from the University of Alabama School of Law at the age of forty-five.  He practiced law for nearly twenty years prior to serving the citizens of this area as District Judge. 

At the age of eighty-two, Sam is still working, still passionately pursuing his love of law, helping his fellow man.  In America today we hear much about both legal and illegal immigration and about a border wall.  Sam helps those who desire and dream to become Americans the right way.  In his private practice in the city of Montgomery, he concentrates on immigration law and is also a public defender. 

Sam’s beloved wife, Pina, would have enjoyed seeing her sweetheart go back home with such a prestigious honor from his high school.  Although she passed away in 2015, she lives on in the lives of her 3 children, 14 grandchildren, and 5 great-grandchildren.  Blessed by his Creator with a great personality, winning ways, and genuine smile, Sam is who he is because of wonderful parents, the son of the late Mr. and Mrs. S.L. Masdon of Haleyville. 

He was a faithful member of the First United Methodist Church of Haleyville and taught adult Sunday School classes for over twenty years. 

Today the Haleyville High School Alumni Association will add the 66th name to our list of alumni who have left these halls to go out into the world.   These 66 have used their lives to make us all proud to call them our own. 

It is with great pleasure that we now present to you, our 2017 Alumnus of the Year…………

…….Sam Masdon