Billy Mathews worked for nearly four decades in the education field in addition to ‘part-time’ jobs in government and the funeral home business. That is all in his rearview mirror now.
“I am really enjoying retired life,” the former educator said last week. “I like to read, and I go out to my pond, throw rocks in the water or catch fish every now and then, but I don’t have any schedule or any pressure to do anything.”
Mathews, 72, did not start or finish school in Jones County. He attended grades one and two in Marion County and graduated from Thomasville High after going there his last two years. His father, William C. Mathews Sr., was principal of those two schools as well as at Jones County High for eight years in between.
Mathews obtained his undergraduate and Master’s degrees from Georgia College and State University and his educational specialist degree in administration from the University of Georgia in 1979.
Mathews is married to the former Fay Connell, and their story is one of ‘being in the right place at the right time.’ They first met while riding on a school bus on a 4-H trip to Savannah for a leadership camp. She was a student from Baldwin County.
“We got to know each other that way, and shortly after that, I moved to Thomasville and lost track of her,” Mathews recalled.
When he moved back to Jones County and was in college, he happened to be at a Three Dog Night concert in Macon. A friend of Fay’,s who had been on the bus trip to Savannah, had decided he looked like his name ought to be George, Mathews said.
“She wouldn’t call me by my name; it was ‘Brother George.’ So, I am at the concert, and I hear ‘Hey Brother George!’ I turn around, and it’s Fay’s friend. And, Fay is with her, a little quieter than her. So, I walk over there, and I leave the person I rode over there with and ride back with them.”
The couple started dating in 1970 and married in 1972 while still in college. They have two children, Brian and Leslie, who each have two children.
Mathews’ mother, Myrle, was also a lifelong educator, starting as a teacher.
“She ended up being curriculum director for the school system for a good 20 years or so,” he pointed out.
“And then when she retired, she started adult education in Jones County out of her own hard work and initiative. I’d been named superintendent by then, and she came to me and said, ‘There’s something I want to do.’ I said, ‘Let’s have at it.’” She did that for about eight to 10 years, Mathews said, before she retired again.
“I know the system was smaller, and I know a less complicated world. But,” he pointed out, “there’s probably six or seven people in this system doing what she did by herself. She was curriculum K through 12, a testing coordinator, a federal programs coordinator, and she was special education director. She was it.”
Myrle Mathews was recognized for her achievements.
“She won the Educator of the Year for the state of Georgia during that period of time,” Mathews said, adding that the two of them may have made a bit of history in that regard.
“We’re probably the only mother and son that got that same recognition. I was also named Educator of the Year for the state of Georgia.” Her award came in the mid-’80s, his in the ’90s.
Mathews also started out in the classroom, teaching for five years. For several years after that, he was the ‘school social worker’.
“You’re working mostly with students that are having trouble attending school or involved in discipline issues, or parents that are struggling,” he explained. “You’re just trying to be a liaison between them and resources to keep their child in school and keep the child moving towards an education.”
Mathews’ last position before becoming superintendent was Lint Jordan’s assistant for the four years leading up to the 1992 election. The former head football coach and longtime superintendent chose to retire in ’92. His assistant said Jordan had his own style and expressed his philosophy in ways that stuck with him.
Mathews recalled there was one saying of Jordan’s that came from his military days. When teachers were standing around, watching students, the superintendent would give them direction.
“He would say, ‘Now, don’t let one shell kill y’all. Everybody is standing together. One shell gets y’all; scatter out.’ And, I found that that came out of my mouth a few times in my career.”
Mathews said he learned from Jordan, but they had different styles.
“I told him, ‘I will not try to fill your shoes. I’ll try to walk your path.’ And you know, I don’t think anybody wanted more for the school system than he did.”
Mathews decided to run for the position in the 1992 election, the last time voters elected the school superintendent. A statewide referendum that same year on whether to make the office an appointed one passed.
Mathews, Wayne Garrett, and school principals John Trimnell and Lani Schewe squared off, and Mathews and Garrett advanced to a runoff, won by Mathews. He went by his parents’ house the night of the runoff, and they both wanted his ears.
“Mama said, ‘If you’re going to be successful, you make sure you take care of your teachers because they are the key to a successful school system... Give them the resources they need to do their job.’” Dad was next, Mathews recollected.
“He said, ‘You take care of your principals. They’ve got a tough job. They need to know that you’ve got their back, and if there’s any problem with them, don’t handle it in public. Handle it with them privately. Show the principal respect for that school and who they are.’“ Mathews actually took office in 1992 when Jordan decided to retire early, and he served in two stints. Both Jones County and the school system grew significantly in his first go-round.
“We went through a real growth spurt — that was during the first housing boom for Jones County with the early start in the late ’80s and going to the to the ’90s — a pretty significant growth there.”
Mathews was reappointed and worked initially for 10.5 years, which gave him 30 years in education. “I decided I wanted to retire and do some other things.”
He served for a short time as interim director for the local Chamber of Commerce and Development Authority before going to work with the Georgia Department of Education in the office of School Improvement. After four years in that position, Mathews went back to his old job.
“Jones County was going through a little bit of an uneasy period in administration,” he recalled, “and they asked me if I would come back as an interim. I did, and I ended up staying for five years. So I retired finally from the school system in 2015.”
Including his time with the state, Mathews had a total of 38 years of on-the-job experience.
The retiree shared a major influence his parents had on him, both as an individual and an administrator.
“They were role models for how to treat people,” Mathews asserted. “I never saw either of them treat any person with disrespect, ever, no matter who they were, no matter their station in life, no matter their bank account or their race or gender, or anything else. I never saw them mistreat any person in my life. They treated every person with respect and insisted we do the same thing.”
Mathews believed — and still believes — in the quality of Jones County’s schools.
“I took pride when they posted test scores and Jones County led the area,” he acknowledged. “I took pride in that, even though I didn’t teach a single child, we had a system in place where this could happen.”
While he believes there may be a few issues that need attention, and he feels they are getting it, Mathews knows Jones County is still a place for parents to send their children to school.
“It’s a place I think somebody could leave their child and have the expectation that the child is going to be treated properly, educated properly and protected,” he declared. “And I think that people can have that expectation. It’s like, ‘when you drop them off, we’re going to give them back to you in better shape than when you left them with us.’ And I still believe that’s true of Jones County.”
Mathews has had a life outside his school system’s offices. He has in the past been a member of the Kiwanis and Rotary Clubs and has sung in First Baptist Church’s choir periodically since the early 1970s. In that same era, he and some friends enjoyed playing together as ‘Brown Eye.’ Mathews and three others formed another vocal group in the early 2000s.
“I sang in a gospel quartet for seven or eight years,” he shared. “And, I had a great experience doing that. It’s like everything in life sometimes is for a season, and the season passed for that.”
Mathews said he, Barry Collins, Richard Robinson, John Rudowski started singing together as Crossroads.
“We had fun doing that. And quite honestly,” he admitted, “it almost got too big; it became more of a struggle than a hobby. And so we just kind of backed off.”
Mathews’ last ‘paying job’ was as a part-time attendant at Hart’s Mortuary in Gray. He did that for several years until 2022, when he left to help care for his mother, who ultimately passed away in early 2024.
William C. Mathews Sr. died 20 years before his wife but not before he gave his son some timely advice. The superintendent, with ample experience and years of service on various boards, was contacted by a friend regarding a position in Texas that would pay him twice as much as he was making at the time.
“I talked to daddy and said, ‘What do you think I ought to do?’ He said, ‘It sounds like a good opportunity, but you’re gonna miss your wife and children because they ain’t going to Texas. My grandchildren and your wife are going to stay here.’ I said, ‘So I think I get your point, daddy.’
“I think what he was telling me, in his way, was that there’s more to it than money. If you are going to make a difference, and you can make a difference in your own home, it’s somehow more satisfying.”
