Education and Military Service
One of eight children, Cotton was born in tiny Corley in Logan County, Arkansas. He graduated in 1917 from high school in Fort Smith, the seat of Sebastian County.
He then joined the United States Navy and served as the chief commissary steward on the USS Oklahoma off the coast of France. In November 1999, he was awarded for his valor during the Great War the National Order of the Legion of Honor, the highest designation honor bestowed by the French on foreign nationals.
After he was discharged from the Navy in 1919, Cotton enrolled at the University of Arkansas in Fayetteville, where he studied accounting for two years. He then went to work for Shipley Bakery in Fort Smith.
In 1929, Cotton wed the former Genevieve Hathorn, who died on December 11, 1963. At the time of Cotton's death, he was married to the former Mae C. Compton (born 1918).
Read more about this topic: William F. Cotton
Famous quotes containing the words education, military and/or service:
“Casting an eye on the education of children, from whence I can make a judgment of my own, I observe they are instructed in religious matters before they can reason about them, and consequently that all such instruction is nothing else but filling the tender mind of a child with prejudices.”
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“The Service without Hope
Is tenderest, I think—
...
There is no Diligence like that
That knows not an Until—”
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