WILLIAM SEWELL DENMAN 

The following bio was taken from page 176 of the book entitled “Rusk County History” compiled and edited and used with permission of the Rusk County Historical Commission.

Transcribed by Shirley Koym

Submitted by Gloria Briley Mayfield, Rusk County TX Coordinator

 Mr. And Mrs. William Sewell Denman and their three children came to Henderson as “Boomers” and have made their permanent home, for the past fifty years.  W. S. “Bill” Denman was born in Bowie, Texas.  He descended from English fore bearers, one of whom was an aide to General George Washington, receiving a gift of silver spurs for his services, and another who donated the land on which Harvard University was built.  Bill Denman was nationally known as a “Rock hound” and a designer and crafter of fine jewelry.  The Denman’s helped to organize the first national “Rollin’ Rock Club,” and he served as its president for many years.  After his death February 10, 1978, Mrs. Denman donated a large collection of specimen gems and minerals to Kilgore College.

 Mrs. Denman (Carmen Edith Cornelius) was descended from early Western pioneers, one of whom was a United States Marshall in Oklahoma territory.  A woman of varied talents, Mrs. Denman was a designer of costumes and evening apparel, a writer of a radio “soap opera,” a professional photographer, one of the first women award-winning photographers in Texas, and a driving force for a two-party system in Rusk County.  She and her sister, Mrs. Martha McDonald, live at 1106 Kilgore Drive in Henderson.

 The Denman’s had three children:  Rosemary, who died at the age of eight; William Jr., who died in World War II; and Ethel Jeanne, now Mrs. Louis F. Hale, Sr. and an administrator at Kilgore College. 

Submitted by Jeanne Hale