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Sheron Cobb poses with Kathryn Galloway James.

Annie Glover talks with Kathryn Galloway.

Mattie Freeney poses with Kathryn Galloway .

Sue Bass Wilson poses with Kathryn Galloway

Kathryn Galloway came home to Andalusia yesterday to begin promoting her book, and paid tribute to her former teachers for her successes.

Galloway recently published, “From the Eyes of The Freedom Baby,” subtitled “The Untold Story of Rev. George Don Galloway,” about the ministry and civil rights work of her father, an A.M.E. minister who marched from Selma to Montgomery in 1965. Kathryn Galloway’s father called “the freedom baby” because she was born days after her mother joined part of the Selma march.

The Rev. Galloway would later pastor Bethel A.M.E. Church in Andalusia, relocating his young family here. Though the church sent him to other communities, the family continued to live in Andalusia, where Kathryn Galloway graduated from AHS in 1983.

Galloway’s father passed in 1992, so she began her research for her book about his work by interviewing her siblings.

“I would take them one by one,” she said. “There were eight of us. I started with the oldest, my sister Barbara. Each sibling would fill out what I needed to know.”

After collecting information from them, she would recount their stories for her mother to see if she remembered the stories the same way.

“My oldest sister worked with my dad a lot, and had a number of newspaper clippings. She kind of helped me to put the puzzle together,” she said. “I started studying who he worked with. A lot of the people who were with him in the civil rights activities were still living. The people of Selma helped me fill in the gaps of what I didn’t know and pull the book together.”

Galloway signed books at the Andalusia Public Library on Thursday afternoon, and spoke to the Covington Historical Society Thursday night. She said her AHS teachers prepared her well for life, and for the loving labor of writing her father’s story.

“Mr. Wingard was my applied English teacher,” she said. “He taught me to use words in a way that everyone could understand, from kindergarten on up. He worked with me so much, and that’s one of the reasons I had so much of the knowledge needed to complete this book.”

She recalled writing stories for Mr. Lewis.

“ ‘Miss Galloway,’ he would tell me. ‘You don’t have to bring me a six-page report. Just tell me the main things.’ But I loved to read and write, so I would always bring six pages anyway.”

Born into a family of musicians, Galloway said she couldn’t wait to follow her siblings into Mrs. Duebelt’s class.

“She taught me how to really, really understand how to read and write music,” she said.

“Andalusia was great for me,” she said. “I would not be standing where I am if not for the foundation I received in Andalusia High School. When I talk and speak with other students from other areas … their schools can’t even touch Andalusia.”

Galloway and her husband reside in Eustis, Fla., where she is a dental hygienist. Prior to her presentation Thursday night, her husband, Daniel James, presented photo-sized photographs of the Rev. Galloway praying with the Rev. Martin Luther King, and marching toward Montgomery to the Historical Society for the Three Notch Museum.

She also was joined by several of her siblings and her mother. The family plans a musical evening this Sat., Jan. 26, beginning at 6 p.m. at the Andalusia Adult Activity Center. The AHS Chorus also will participate. Friends are invited to join them.

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