Golden Days: Reminiscences of Alumnae, Mississippi State College for Women

Barbara McMillin Webb, Class of 1957

APRIL 19, 2007 INTERVIEWED BY SARAH SHEFFIELD TRANSCRIBED BY RACHEL FORESTER ^/ARBARA MCMILLIN WAS BORN ON AUGUST 9, 1936, in Louisville , Mississippi, to Oliver Frank McMillin and Alice Irene Robison McMillin. At MSCW, she majored in library science and wasactive in numerous groups, including the 4-H Club, the Future Teachers of America, and the Alpha Psi Omega drama honorary society. She served as an officer in the Westminster Fellowship for Presbyterian students. A speech minor, she was also very active in the Theatre Guild, serving as the assistant director and director of Tournament Plays during her sophomore and junior years. She began her career as a librarian at Mississippi State University and subsequently became head librarian at Belhaven College in Jackson, Mississippi. In 1958, she married William Larry Webb of Louisville, a manager in the poultry industry. She served as a high school librarian, speech teacher, and counselor before taking the post of director of Upward Bound at Copiah-Lincoln Community College. In 379 Class of 1957 Barbara McMillin Webb B 1969, she was honored as Southern Speech Teacher of the Year, and the following year she was the featured speaker at the Ws Homecoming. While at Co-Lin, she was a Phi Theta Kappa Top Ten Adviser and president of the Mississippi Association of Educational Opportunity Programs. She retired from Co-Lin in 2000. She has been active in a variety of civic organizations, including the American Heart Association and the Daughters of the American Revolution, and she served aspresident of Women of the Church of her local Presbyterian congregation. She now lives in Hazelhurst, Mississippi. BW: I grew up in Winston County, Mississippi, and both of my parents were very supportive, very Christian people. It was interesting that in my childhood, I was programmed from the earliest that I would go to college. It was perhaps very unusual for my generation that both of my grandmothers had college degrees, and my mother had a college degree. So education for women wasvery important in our family. I had a younger brother who was about eighteen months younger than I was, and we had a farm of about four hundred acres. Our family farmed, and that was our main livelihood. I wasvery active in a lot of school activities , particularly in 4-H Club work and things of that sort. When my younger brother got into Future Farmers of America and was showing beef cattle, the agriculture teacher did something that was unheard of at that time; he allowed a girl to show. I was the only girl in Winston County that was allowed to show her beef cattle in the FFA contest as well as in the 4-H contest. SS: How did you decide to attend the W? BW: My paternal grandmother1 was in one of the first classes at II & C, so she had a degree from here. I think it wasmaybe a two-year certificate in business or something of that sort, in one of the very early classes. I had known about the W all of my life, and I was always interested in i. Ella Watson McMillin (1872-1944), Class of 1889. 380 Classof1957 it. I had friends that I had known in 4-H that were older than I that had come to the W. But my heart s desire was to go to Mississippi State because I wanted to be a veterinarian. My grandfather had taken a veterinary course and did a lot of the veterinary work for our community, and I always was his assistant, and I helped him do all those things. But my daddy was very emphatic about the fact that nice girls did not go to Mississippi State and live in the dormitory, and that was completely out. At that time, I thought that was the only way I'd ever get in vet school was to go to Mississippi State. So I had to find something else to do, and I decided on a library science degree. Isn't that different from veterinary science? But anyway, I chose to come to the W after visiting here; then there was no doubt that waswhat I wanted to do. SS:What were your first impressions of the campus? BW: I always thought it was a beautiful campus, and I was real excited about living in Hastings, which was the dorm as far as I was concerned my freshman...