MARION, La. (AP) - The Waynes are a large family with relatives in states across the nation, but they claim Marion, a small town about 45 miles outside of Grambling, as their home.
The News-Star reports (https://tnsne.ws/1lWdPKO ) the Waynes also are claiming to have set the record for the largest number of family members to attend the same university: Grambling State.
The family has applied for consideration by Guinness World Records and Hattie Wayne, owner of Hattie Wayne Public Relations & Advertising, is leading the family’s effort to verify that claim.
“We’re talking almost seven generations,” Hattie Wayne said.
She submitted the claim in August, and Guinness approved it in October.
Since then, she said she’s been gathering the required evidence to prove her family’s claim. “Part of that is getting the names of the students verified through GSU, and other information such as certificates - graduate certificates - identification, and we’re still working on that,” she said.
So far, GSU registrar Patricia Hutcherson has verified that 86 Wayne family members - from 10 branches of the family spanning more than five generations - enrolled at GSU and that 51 Waynes graduated.
“If there are three kids in the family, all those kids went to college,” Hattie Wayne said. “My cousin Carlisle had 13 kids, and at least seven went to Grambling.”
The Waynes believe in education, said Cathy Wasson-Park Conwright, president of the Dallas alumni chapter for GSU. “It was instilled in us from birth that we were going to college. It wasn’t if you were going to college - it was where you were going. And nine times out of ten, it was Grambling.”
Indeed, the Wayne forefathers seem to have cultivated a deep respect of education in their descendants. Hattie Wayne tracked their genealogy back to two groups of siblings, grouping the GSU graduates based on their grandparents and great-grandparents.
Shirley Wayne, a retired music teacher who taught during the time of integration in southern Louisiana, credits her grandfather, Thomas Wayne Sr., and his brothers - King Wayne, Sandy Wayne Sr. and John Wayne Sr. - for inspiring her with a respect for learning.
“They stressed that with us,” Shirley Wayne said. “Our grandfathers would challenge us on books of the Bible, and they would give us money when we were right. We all knew we were going to college. … It was a done deal. You didn’t have a mind to make up.”
Though he graduated from Louisiana Tech University after attending GSU for two years, Lt. Col. Donald Tatum, a descendant of Sandy Wayne Sr., said all five of his children graduated from GSU. His second son, Lt. Col. Michael Tatum, was stationed at The Pentagon in August 2013 but was killed in a car accident on Aug. 24 in Washington, D.C.
When his son graduated in May 1997, Donald Tatum said he made sure all his grandchildren attended the graduation. “I wanted them to see and feel the emotion and get a feel for what it’s like to graduate, and the fact of the matter is that all of my grandkids, if they attend GSU, I’m working to try to fund it.”
Though he said he’d never considered how many relatives actually attended GSU, Donald Tatum reported excitement about the record attempt.
“Attending school and going to school has been part of our culture and our upbringing, passed down to us from generation to generation. To find out now that many of our relatives (attended Grambling), that our footprint is embedded at that university - it’s exciting,” he said.
Still, not every Wayne decides to enroll at GSU.
“We have an equal amount of cousins probably who have gone to Southern University,” Hattie Wayne acknowledges.
“Half the family members of my generation, the sixth generation, had attended Southern University too,” Donald Tatum said. “There’s a big rivalry . When you get together with the black and gold and the other colors, we each think we’ve attended the finest university.”
He describes parents and grandparents sitting around the younger generations, laughing at the graduates from each school as they “go back and forth” debating.
When asked about the number of her relatives who attended Southern, Conwright said, “I don’t know. I don’t talk about other schools!”
In thanks for decades of education reaching back to the 1940s, the Wayne family plans to create an endowment at GSU under the family name.
“We are active participants, but we feel that if after this, we can become even more active in helping the school, that’s what we’re all about at this point,” Hattie Wayne said.
“We’re trying to pass that on and do other things for the university because it is a fine university and it doesn’t get total credit for the impact that it’s had on people’s lives,” Donald Tatum said.
Conwright said her alumni chapter recently presented GSU with a check for $10,000.
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Information from: The News-Star, https://www.thenewsstar.com
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