Thursday, December 24, 2020 10:52 am
In my earliest memory of my father, Kermit Gibby “Gib” Nelson, he was singing a song.
It was the song he learned at his birth, Dec. 27, 1933, from his parents, Elisha “Mockingbird” Nelson and Pearl Nelson. It was a song he later taught his brothers and sisters: Janet Hardeman, Nell Jenkins, Kenneth Nelson, Ida Green, Elizabeth Carter, and Tommy Nelson.
It was the song he was singing when he entered the U.S. Air Force. For two decades, he sung it in service to his country, as a veteran of the Korean and Vietnam wars. When he retired after 21 years, he carried on singing for Liberty National Life Insurance.