Gus Coleman was an educator for nearly his entire career.
The lifelong Del City resident, who has since passed away, worked in every aspect of the scholastic endeavor: textbook sales, teacher, coach, principal, superintendent and even college regent.
Coleman’s son, Del City attorney Steve Coleman, speaks fondly of his parent’s love of learning. Between the two of them, he said, they had a combined 88 year career in education.
But it was his father’s love of learning that was honored last month when Epperly Heights Elementary dedicated their new library media center to him.
The son called his father an advocate of literature who understood the importance of always having a library.
In his first years as a teacher, Coleman’s father took it upon himself to create a library for his students, his son said.
"In 1958 when dad and mom got to Epperly, my dad noticed that there was no library in the school," Coleman said. "So he sought and received permission from the then principal to persuade the teachers at Epperly to give up the teachers’ lounge. The teachers agreed to do that."
Coleman’s father was able to secure donations that began to fill the library, thanks to his connections to publishing firms from his earlier work in textbook sales.
"One thing about teachers, they always spend money out of their pocket to buy books for their kids," Steve Coleman said. "For most teachers, teaching is essentially a love affair. Many teachers will take a few extra bucks out of each pay check and buy things for their class and many times those are books."
Just a teacher himself, Coleman spearheaded the effort to bring a fully stocked working library to Epperly Heights.
Earlier in Coleman’s career, he used his influence and rural upbringing to make steps in the direction of equality years before it became a national movement, his son said.
"Five years before the Supreme Court decision in Brown v. Board of Education, our entire society was segregated but my dad had grown up in rural Seminole County and his best friends growing up were all Seminole Indians.
"My dad’s views on race were different than a lot of people at that time cause if he didn’t he wouldn’t have had any one to play with."
Fast forward to the late ‘40s in McCloud, Coleman continued to showcase his idea that everyone should have access to literacy and learning. His son explained that at the end of the school year when Coleman’s school district was set to receive new textbooks, he wanted to take all of the surplus books that normally would have been thrown away, to an all-black school east of McLoud.
"Dad asked if he could take on the responsibility of gathering the surplus books… this was a radical thing to do at that time."
Gus Coleman’s ability to generate the votes required to pass major bond issues and get the money a school district needs still inspires those charged with these practices today.
Coleman interacted with a vast majority of the members of the current school board, his son said.
David Bibens and Darrel Eike were both former assistant principals under Coleman. These and many other people he impacted in his time decided to dedicate Epperly Height’s media center to his legacy.
At the Dec. 16 dedication, Coleman donated a large painting of former president John F. Kennedy that had hung in his dad’s office during his tenure at Epperly Heights.
He then ended with this quote by JFK.
"If this nation is to be wise as well as strong, if we are to achieve our destiny, then we need more new ideas for more wise men reading more good books in more public libraries."
