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Saturday, May 19, 2012
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You are here ::PoliticsLymus Wallace
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I currently do not have information on the dates of birth and death for Lymus Wallace.

Lymus Wallace, a prominent Memphian of color, occupied several positions in the city government at various times. 

A self-made man, Wallace was ambitious and a hard worker. When a youth he was a hostler, then became a drayman.  He operated a saloon at 117 Beale Street in 1883 and was also a contractor in 1884.  In 1882 and again in 1886, he was elected to four year terms as Alderman, and was said to be the first Negro Alderman in Memphis.  According to the Commercial Appeal, at that time an Alderman "...actually was membership on the Board of Supervisors of Public Works. There was a three member Police and Fire Commission and a five member public works board..."

In 1887, he was a member of a Committee of Memphians who went to Washington, D.C., to invite President Grover Cleveland to visit Memphis. President Cleveland accepted and came to Memphis in October of that year with his bride on a honeymoon tour.  Wallace made a sizeable contribution toward the entertainment of the President. 

He served also as a member of the Board of Education at one time. 

A news item in The Commercial Appeal, May 15, 1886 states: Councilman Lymus Wallace wants it understood he has not been attacking women. He decked out a lawyer who insulted him, paid the fine for it, was dismissed and went about his business..."

Lymus Wallace and his wife, Nannie, were the parents of nine children.

The Wallaces lived one block south of the home of their friends, Mr. and Mrs. Robert Church, Sr., in the 400 block of South Lauderdale Street.  Their next door neighbor was Kenneth D. McKeller, who later became the famous member of the U.S. Senate from Tennessee.  The oldest of his children, a daughter, Lula, (1885-1975), a Memphis teacher, and the rest of his family moved to Chicago after his death. Lula located in a Chicago suburb, Robbins, Illinois, where she was a teacher until her retirment.  She resided in Robbins until her death.

Roberta Church and Ronald Walter

  
Here the history of Memphis is presented.  From the Chickasaw to the great New Madrid earthquake of 1811 on to the land's purchase by John Overton and Andrew Jackson, followed by incorporation and Civil War occupation.  Picking up with the yellow fever followed by the surrender of the city charter and the tenure of the former city as a taxing district of Shelby County and the state of Tennessee.  We continue Memphis history into the days of Crump and the progressive era when the city would be made to conform to order.  Memphis history is rich with time, music and commerce.  From the blues of Beale Street to Elvis Presley and Sun Records the City of Memphis been enriched by transporation, cotton, mules and hardware; bridge openings to celebrate and the sorrows of the 1968 Sanitation Strike which culminated in the death of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.  Memphis has persevered through pain and has been anything but dull.  This is our story...
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