Happy 104th birthday to Murray Payton

A Cedartown man who has a lifetime of memories continues to make more as he celebrated his 104th birthday.

Murray Payton celebrated his birthday on March 23 as he looks back on struggles growing up during the Great Depression, World War II and personal tragedies in a busy life.

Payton was born in Glenlock, Georgia, in 1913 to Beunah and William Payton, one of four brothers and a sister.

His family survived the hard times of the Great Depression according to daughter Carole Buttram by growing their own food and only purchasing small items they absolutely needed from a weekly “rolling store” that came through their community.

Later, Buttram said her father escaped the difficulties of life on the farm during the Great Depression by heading off to find an industrial job, and marry Frances Crews. They had their first daughter, Buttram, before he was drafted into World War II on the cruiser USS Portland with only a ninth-grade education.

“During those years, particularly on those long night watches on the top of the ship, he prayed for God to direct his path towards a way he could provide for his family after the war,” Buttram wrote in an email. “One night while praying he had a supernatural experience that he has never doubted nor experienced since.”

Buttram said her father was told by God that he should return home to his family and go into the dry cleaning business, which he did, and he prospered over the coming decades in the LaGrange, Georgia, area. They had a second daughter, Cathy, who was born during the postwar years.

Payton lost his wife, Frances, to cancer at the age of 48 in 1966, and remarried Helen Yates, a widow of a dry cleaning supplies salesman having set up a “blind date.” They were married for 40 years before her death in 2008.

He later moved to the Cedartown area to live with his daughter Carole and son-in-law Jerry Buttram, pastor of the Calvary Assembly of God, and only moved into Winthrop at Polk in 2016 at the age of 103. He also made occasional visits before moving into the assisted living facility to Folly Beach, S.C.

There he enjoys a daily routine of three home cooked meals and about as many snacks as he wants, Buttram said.

“He is able to walk more and more safely throughout the facility and grounds on a daily basis,” she said. “He loves to play games and competition. There he enjoys daily group activities.”

Buttram said one of his hobbies until a few years ago was growing prize winning roses. Once he had as many as 100 rose bushes and he knew them all by name.

“His main hobby most of his latter adult life has been making preserves and jellies,” she said. “He made a big batch of strawberry preserves right before entering Winthrop. He loves giving them to others and his homemade ones are about the only ones he wants to eat.”