More About Tom Chilvers
By Brooke Reddest
Although there are quite a few residents in the town of Pierce, Tom Chilvers is Pierce’s longest lifetime resident at 97 and a half years old, which is quite an accomplishment. Chilvers went to school in Pierce and graduated in 1943. His graduating class consisted of just nine boys and 34 girls. Chilvers says his favorite high school memory “Wasn’t when I graduated, because I just barely remember that, and it wasn’t playing on the football team because I wasn’t that good. It wasn’t working in the woodshop because I wasn’t that good there. I enjoyed a lot of the classes, mathematics especially, or anything of the science and mathematics field, I enjoyed. Singing in the chorus was alright. The fellowship of the other guys was nice, too.”
He says he can remember when there were a whole lot of country and elementary schools. There were some of the towns, like Osmond, around here were out there dragging in the elementary schools in, and by golly they got it done.
Chilvers has served on a few different boards in his time here in Pierce. “A long time after I graduated, I was on the school board for about seven, eight, nine years and we went to a lot of rural schoolhouses to fill our goods, you might say. That probably was the highlight of some of my connection with school.”
Around town, he served on other boards, including the Pawnee Extension board, and a soil conservation board, and church boards.
Chilvers is a member of the Pierce United Church of Christ. “I was baptized in that church. It was a congregational church at that time, and then nationwide they changed to the United Church of Christ, and I’ve always been there. My wife plays the organ there yet.”
The Chilvers’ family made many contributions to Pierce. “My grandfather Chilvers owned the whole block west of the tennis courts, and my parents owned the whole block north of the tennis court. There’s nothing on there, except for their own house. The family donated that to the city as a park, many, many years ago. It had some restrictions on it so nobody would make big, big buildings there and everything else. When I was born, my dad was the mayor, so they had to let me live in Pierce. When I graduated from high school, my dad was on the school board.”
When Chilvers was in school, there were only three sports: football, basketball, and track. He played basketball and football in high school.
“Where Casey’s is right now, that was a football (field) that was built in about 1942. Prior to that, we would practice out at the fairgrounds right in front of the grandstands. In the shoulder of the dirt, there was a nice patch of sandburs on that thing. You didn’t want to fall there too badly. But that’s where they used to play football back then.”
Chilvers is very knowledgeable about the history of the schools and Pierce, giving he witnessed it first-hand. “We brought then elementary kids in from out of Pierce, but we needed more room for them so the elementary was built in the early 60s, I’m guessing roughly ’62. The building I was in was built in 1923, and prior to that, the building my mother went to when she was in school was just west.”
Chilvers obviously loves Pierce, given he’s lived here for his whole life. He was kind enough to share some of his favorite things about living in Pierce. “The people are wonderful, the merchants are wonderful. I’ve got neighbors that scoop my snow off my driveway and sidewalk. The merchants treat you very good here, and I like them all. It’s a different spirit than you would have in a large city. I don’t want to live in a large city.” Chilvers and his wife, Charlene, have two children. “I’ve got a daughter, Marilyn, who lives in Omaha and is a retired pharmacist, and I’ve got a son Steve who lives three miles north of Pierce. He’s a full-time farmer. For grandchildren, Steve has two boys. One lives in Omaha, and one lives at home and is farming with Steve.”
Chilvers has two brothers. “One was born in Pierce, and one was born in the Norfolk hospital. I was born two blocks west of the telephone office. Right across the street is where my mother’s folks lived. Her dad was a merchant in Pierce. My grandfather came from overseas from England, and he homesteaded just west of where the sale barn used to be in Plainview. They gardened flowers, potatoes, and more until heck wouldn’t have any. When that farmland sold, I moved north of the tennis courts. I lived there until a couple months after I graduated, then I enlisted in the Army. Then over winter, I went to Fort Benning, Georgia, which is a huge, huge, huge place. And then I went to a place in Louisiana and then a couple of camps out in California. Then they put us on a train and sent us over to Boston where we jumped on a boat. It was just short of three years that I served. I ended up all the way in Austria. In fact, one day a bunch of guys got in a truck and went to Hitler’s place. Then we came home, and I went to the University of Nebraska where I met my wife, Charlene.”
In 1950, Chilvers graduated from UNL, which is the same year he married his current wife.
Charlene Chilvers, states, “I remember that there weren’t very many classes or teachers. There were about three math classes, a couple of English (classes), and I know we had to take American History and Civics. That’s why they could have all of the high school and grade school students in one building.”
The Chilvers’ have been living in Pierce for quite some time, but they’ve been living in their current house in Pierce since 2003 and are proud to say that that’s where they plan on staying.
