Kenneth Anderson Floyd, a career educator, public servant, beloved patriarch, and noted family historian, passed away peacefully on March 19, 2024, at Ascension Saint Thomas West Hospital in Nashville, TN. He was 90.
Though never married, Kenneth fostered and raised four sons who survive him, passing on to them his lifelong love of family, learning, and music.
A native of Watertown, TN, and graduate of the local high school, he earned his undergraduate degree in music in the first coed class of then Ward-Belmont College in Nashville, TN. After college, he enlisted in the US Air Force and was stationed in San Antonio, TX, where he continued to pursue his music interests as a chaplain’s assistant.
After a four-year stint in the military, he accepted a teaching job in San Antonio, and by the age of 26 was named principal of Locke Hill Elementary School in San Antonio. He later taught at St. Mary’s University in San Antonio. Eventually he moved back to Tennessee to help care for his mother upon the passing of his father. Once back in Tennessee, he held administrative positions at Watertown Junior High and Mt. Juliet Junior High, while also serving as choir director at First Baptist Church Watertown where he and his family were members.
An interest in expanding his professional experiences led him to make a midlife career change by accepting a position as Director of the Tennessee Commission on Aging. While at the State, he oversaw the implementation of numerous major policy initiatives to improve the quality of life for Tennessee’s seniors. He retired from public service in I998.
The son of Elroy and Macon Floyd, Kenneth was born on June 8, 1933, in Watertown at the time of the Depression, sharing a home on a farm and later in town with his four siblings, his late brother Edsel Floyd, late sisters Dorothy (Dot) Harvey, Gwen Patton, and his surviving sister Paulette Dorris. His love of family and history was forged in those early years, listening intently to the stories passed down by his elders, which he later meticulously recorded in his unofficial capacity as the family historian. Throughout most of his life, Kenneth would weave into his vacations visits to places that were the sites of family lore, cemeteries where family members were buried, and drop ins to local courthouses where he would scour public records to further his research.
When age began to limit his travel and mobility, he would spend hours each day at his home-office computer, logging in every detail he could confirm about the lives of those who came before him. On holidays, he was known to bind into voluminous books the results of his research and give them out as gifts to family. He believed that through his genealogy work he could help keep alive the memories of his ancestors for generations to come.
A skilled pianist who possessed a powerful tenor voice, he relished every opportunity to lead others in song at church and family gatherings, leaning more often than not into the hymns of his youth. In his final years, he would fall asleep every night listening to his favorite music recordings on a CD player beside his bed.
Among his hobbies was a love of sports, from figure skating to basketball, having been a long-time season ticket holder and supporter of Vanderbilt Women’s Basketball. He also pursued a lifelong interest in antiques, as both an avid collector and widely respected dealer in Texas and Tennessee of rare glass works, ceramics, jewelry, and furniture.
Quick-witted with an enormous vocabulary, Kenneth had a great passion for the written word and was a voracious reader. Even when his eyesight began to fail him, he never abandoned his daily reading regimen, but instead shifted to reading from large print editions of his favorite literature.
Of all his many life endeavors, experiences, and accomplishments, he often referred to his fostering of four children as his greatest accomplishment. He took in Jesse Orozco and Terry Booth from the Boysville Children’s Home and Shelter in San Antonio, Mike Kopp, who he met while serving as choir director at Beacon Hill Baptist Church in San Antonio, and Steve Vincent, who he met through his contacts in Tennessee state government. All four regarded Kenneth as their father, and for his 90th birthday they presented him with a bracelet that his son Jesse had made which bore the names of all four men. Steve, who resided with Kenneth, became his full-time caretaker in recent years.
Kenneth is survived by his youngest sister Paulette Dorris, sons Jesse Orozco, Terry Booth and wife Janet, Mike Kopp and his partner Carrie Tillis (who Kenneth regarded as his unofficial adopted daughter), and Steve Vincent, along with niece Judy Gutting and her husband Louis, niece Merry Croft and her husband Terrance, nephew Hugh Patton and his wife Natalie, niece Susan Headrick and her husband Mike, nephew John Harvey and his wife Jeanette, niece Michelle Swafford and her husband Keith, niece Nicholle Bagnall and her husband Michael, nephew William Dorris, nephew Mark Floyd, nephew Chris Floyd and his wife Jo Boyce.
He was preceded in death by his late brother Edsel Floyd and his late wife Margie, late sister Dorothy Harvey, late sister Gwen Patton and her late husband Leonard, late niece Betty Willard and her late husband Aubrey, and late nephew Mike Floyd. Kenneth is also survived by 7 grandchildren and 16 great-grandchildren.
Per Kenneth’s wishes, there will be no public viewing or service, but rather a family gathering in celebration of his life to be held at a later date. https://www.hunterfuneral.com
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