The Kiwanis Club of Winnfield has named Tommy and Helen Lynn Bankston as Grand Marshals of the 2025 Winnfield Christmas Parade, slated for Friday, December 5, beginning at 6 p.m.
“It’s an honor to be selected by an organization whose focus is on the development and success of children,” Mrs. Bankston told the Journal. Both of the Bankstons invested their careers in the field of education where Helen Lynn spent 30 years and Tommy 25.
Their first encounter was an instance of farming country (Winnsboro) meeting forestry country (Winnfield) when the two met at a party here and sparks flew, leading to 68 years of marriage. They had actually been in the same place some years earlier but didn’t connect. “I was playing for the Wildcats against the Tigers on the old football field on South Jones Street,” said Bankston. “She was sitting up in the stands, cheering for Winnfield.”
She started first grade at Westside Elementary (now WPS) the year it opened in 1941. In high school she performed with a group of friends called “Sisters” who “sang everywhere including Earl Long’s campaign for governor when he handed out watermelons. I liked kids a lot. My mother, Pauline Drewett LaCroix, was a teacher.”
She pursued her education at University of Southwestern Louisiana (now ULL) while he headed to Louisiana College (now Louisiana Christian University). They graduated in 1957 and married that same year. Both would teach in Lake Charles. Bankston taught and coached at Farmerville. Then while she taught in Winnsboro, he attended Northeast Louisiana University (now ULM) for his Master’s Degree. He landed the head football coaching position at Ferriday in 1965 before coming to Winnfield in 1966.
“Coming here was the best thing that ever happened to us,” he declared. “It’s been quite a life.” In that first year, WSHS won the district championship, quite an achievement for a team that went 1-9 the previous season. Bankston was named “Coach of the Year.” He coached for four years before moving on to principal during the first year of integration. “We laid down the law. We had a good school.”
He would serve as principal of WSHS for five years during which time it was voted among the Top 5 High Schools in the state. From 1975 until 1980, he was Winn’s Superintendent of Schools. Winnfield Middle School first opened its doors in 1978. Following those 25 years in education, he told the Journal that he turned his attention to a different age group, from 1981 to 2005 “in the nursing home industry, including Parkview Care Center here in Winnfield. The time here was a good experience. It helped me be a better person, doing all those things.”
Helen Lynn remained engaged in elementary education through to her retirement in 1994. She loved teaching and while she can’t recall any fourth grade classes, she remembers teaching everything else from Grades 1 through 6. Her first job in Winn was at Sikes where second and third grades were taught in the same room. Afterwards, she taught at each Eastside (later WKS) and Westside.
“We put on plays with educational topics. We did everything we could to make learning fun. Staci Wiley related that she always looked forward to square dancing. Now I see these kids…who are now adults…at Wal-Mart and get to see and hear how what we did had a positive impact.”
The Bankstons have two children, Lyn and Susan, 5 grandchildren and 8 great grandchildren.
As they lead this Christmas Parade, the couple may well be waving at some of their former students and players and likely children or grandchildren of those students.
