Don Hughes
Member Spotlight

Don Hughes, Donald Jay Hughes to be precise, is probably the first person you meet when you come to Taylor FUMC.  His smiling face is there every Sunday as the usher for our services.  He sits on the back row, which he and the other faithful laughingly call “Sinner’s Row.”  From that alone you can tell the merry twinkle in his eyes stems from a great sense of humor.

Don likes nothing better than help people.  He had a beloved aunt who was in a wheelchair.  He would pick her up and bring her to church.   He has helped several others in the same way.  He remembers enjoying singing with his aunt their favorite hymn: “How Great Thou Art.”  And his other favorite hymn is “In the Garden”.    

Don loves Taylor FUMC, having attended since childhood and during the time the church worshipped in the old building on Fifth Street.  “It seems like a close-knit group,” he says.  He likes the get-togethers and the events where people work together.  He fondly remembers Vacation Bible School from the old church, as well as MYF when the youth would play the Baptists in different games.

Don was born in Taylor, Texas, although his family farmed in Beyersville some eight miles away.  His middle name, Jay, was after the doctor that delivered him.  Later, during the depression, the family moved to Taylor.  He has an older sister, Florean, who lives in Tomball, and had an older brother who passed away before Don was born.

Don’s family is very important to him and in fact it’s kind of hard to get him to talk about anything else.  He has three daughters, Brenda and Donna both live in Hutto, and Kimberly who lives in Taylor.  Don’s wife, Bonnie, passed away in 2001.  Bonnie had four children by a previous marriage, and Don is still close to them.  Then, there’s the grandkids.  Each daughter has two children.  The grandchildren’s professions range from high school coach to police dispatcher.

Family times included a lot of fishing and camping.  He would help the girls learn to bait the hooks.  He also went camping with his cousins.  Once, after a flood, they were swimming in the river and they stepped on a dead cow.  Everyone was scared, and they all jumped out.  It’s a story that everyone remembers to this day. 

Don served in the Air Force for 25 years, having enlisted in 1955.  While stationed at the F.E. Warren Air Force Base in Wyoming, he attended technical school, and later became an instructor.  His specialty was supply and distribution.  He served at numerous bases in the US, and did tours in Viet Nam, France, French Morocco and England.  In England, his daughters lived on base with him and Bonnie, and they especially loved him being in the Air Force because they got to travel all over Europe.  Don remembers helping coach the softball teams which went to different bases to compete.

After retiring from the Air Force, Don and his family came back to Taylor.  For many years, he worked at Westinghouse and Intercraft.  He and Bonnie had planned to go traveling when he retired, but she came down with lymphatic cancer and passed away before they had the chance.  If he had the chance now, he would love to go to the Grand Canyon and to Niagara Falls.

Be sure to give Don an extra hug when you see him for all of the loving kindness he brings to our church!