Frank Lockwood FitzSimons Sr. was a school teacher, banker, football coach, broadcast journalist, register of deeds, farmer, dairyman, soldier during World War I who received the Navy Cross and Henderson County’s premier and most revered memory keeper.
FitzSimons wrote three volumes of local lore and tall tales entitled “From the Banks of the Oklawaha.”
With his slow, steady drawl the storyteller entertained thousands of local residents at 6 p.m. each evening in the 1950s and 1960s on the WHKP radio station telling tall tales, myths and legends.
“Next, stories about Henderson County and its people … from the sparkling, rippling banks of the Oklawaha,” is an introduction many will never forget.
“As a child I spent my summers walking these mountains, talking to people, and gathering their stories and legends,” he once said.
“Each story uncovered would bring back a flood of memories of the wonderful people I had known; the recollections would be vivid of those long, tedious climbs up mountain sides, the fording of creeks, the smell of the woods fires, the excitement of finding a new story to tell,” he wrote in his preface in 1979 for the third volume of his series.
FitzSimons was born April 17, 1897, in Grand Rapids, Mich., the son of Gaillard Stony FitzSimons and Susan C. Lockwood FitzSimons. His father was born in Charleston, S.C., and his mother in Kentucky. He was the grandson of Susan Milliken Barker who married Christopher FitzSimons.
The family was living in Spartanburg County, S.C., prior to 1900. He and his father’s family spent summers in Henderson County in the Mills River community. He resided in Spartanburg County, S.C., when he enlisted in the Navy during World War I.
After his service in World War I, he attended Wofford College in South Carolina.
He married Margarita Kershaw.
FitzSimons resided in Henderson County from about 1921 until his death in 1980.
In the 1950s he began telling his stories on WHKP Radio. At 6 p.m. for 5,000 evenings and almost 25 years Fitzsimons told his stories about the people of Henderson County.
“The old man on the mountain” as he was sometimes called compiled those broadcasts into a three-volume set of books that contain anecdotes and tall tales, folklore and superstitions, along with some history.

World War I

FitzSimons received the Navy Cross in World War I, the second highest military award for valor that may be awarded to a member of the Navy, Marines or Coast Guard for extraordinary heroism in combat. It is equivalent to the Army’s Distinguished Service Cross and the Air Force Cross. He was a Navy medic serving with a Marine Corps unit in France.
“The President of the United States of America takes pleasure in presenting the Navy Cross to Pharmacist’s Mate Third Class Frank L. Fitzsimmons, United States Navy, for extraordinary heroism and devotion to duty while serving as Corpsman with the Sixth Regiment (Marines), A.E.F, in action near Bayonville, 2 November 1918. After his gas mask and overcoat had been torn from him by a shell fragment, Pharmacist’s Mate Third Class Fitzsimmons continued the advance and exposed himself while dressing the wounded. He was exceptionally courageous and efficient in this work and thereby saved many lives.”
Fitzsimons was with the Marines at Soissons, Meuse-Argonne and Belleau Wood.

Teacher and Leader

For more than 20 years FitzSimons was a teacher in the public school system. He taught at several schools in Henderson County, including some of the early small schools before consolidation of the schools was completed.
He was twice elected Henderson County Register of Deeds.
He was vice president and a director of the State Trust Co. that later merged with the Northwestern Bank. His career in banking spanned 25 years.
In 1922, FitzSimons wrote a letter to the editor to the Hendersonville newspaper proposing a central marketing location for local farmers. He envisioned an area of commerce set up along the curb of a downtown street, a place for housewives to shop and farmers to sell the ”truck crops” grown on their farms.
This was the beginning of the historic Henderson County Curb Market. FitzSimons served on the Curb Market Board for 15 years.
FitzSimons received the Thomas Wolfe Memorial Literary Award in 1977 for the book “From the Banks of the Oklawaha.”
The local history and genealogy room at the Henderson County Public Library is named the FitzSimons Historical Room.
He once said though that his greatest achievement was as the football coach when Hendersonville High School won its first football game.

A storyteller

FizSimons was a storyteller. He wrote and stated numerous times that he was not a historian. He was a teller and a writer of stories.
“It is not a history book, though it contains historical material,” he wrote in the author’s preface of his books. “It is not a genesis of Henderson County families, though it does include biographical material … It is not a compilation of mountain lore, though my stories gathered from ‘the old man on the mountain’ do give a pretty fair reflection of life in the days that were.”
“Frank FitzSimons is, among his many accomplishments, a master story teller; one of a vanishing breed who can breathe life into the dry dust of the past,” wrote Grady Edney, the editor of the Fitzsimon’s books.
Most local residents remember a grandmother sitting in her favorite rocking chair on the porch maybe peeling apples. Surrounding her were grandchildren listening as she told family stories passed down for generations. During the winter months, grandfathers would sit next to the stove smoking their pipes as they told more stories in an accent still containing elements of the Welsh people or with an Old English dialect.
Children and grandchildren followed parents into the kitchens, gardens, fields and orchards, not only helping with chores, but listening to story after story of the people who came before them.
Frank FitzSimons told those stories. He preserved those stories passed down for many generations.
Storytelling is an Appalachian Mountain tradition passed down from generation to generation.
Tucked away in mountain hollows and coves, the myths, legends and folk tales were packed into the minds of the Cherokee and the early pioneers and passed along orally from generation to generation.
With a story, a person does not have to worry about separating fact from fiction and embellishments abound. With a story, one does not have to search for primary source documentation. And a story passed for many generations is embellished and changed from storyteller to storyteller.
Myths, legends and folk tales describe the traditions and heritage of the mountain people. And FitzSimons preserved for generations the traditions and heritage of the people of Henderson County.
Myths give a religious or supernatural explanation for something, as how the world began in Cherokee tradition or how a particular custom began in any culture. Some myths describe some actual historical event, but have been embellished and refashioned by various storytellers over time so that it is impossible to tell what really happened.
A legend is typically a story that was written at some point in time and then transmitted orally from generation to generation. A legend is told as if it were a historical event, rather than an explanation for something or a symbolic narrative. The legend may or may not be an elaborated version of a historical event.
Folk tales, also transmitted orally from generation to generation, are true fiction. Usually they involve magic or magical creatures or people who can accomplish extraordinary feats. Jack Tales are the most famous of the Appalachian Mountain people’s folk tales.
The myths, legends and folk tales of Henderson County are preserved, remembered and cherished in three volumes of books compiled by the greatest storyteller in Henderson County – Frank Lockwood FitzSimons Sr.